Holland Baroque & Constantinople: Where Baroque Meets the Orient | New Album “Dialogos”
The delicate, silvery tone of baroque violins intertwines with the clear, plucked sounds of lute and zither – specifically, the setar and kanun. Subtle percussion supports unusual time signatures, like 7/8. Above it all, expansive melodies unfold. This is the sound of Holland Baroque’s new album, , a project led by the composing twin sisters Judith and Tineke Steenbrink, and a testament to their commitment to musical boundary-crossing.
While the album features scarcely a note of original baroque music, the arrangements of Turkish and Persian pieces fit seamlessly into the “Old Music” scene. Holland Baroque joins forces with the Montreal-based ensemble Constantinople in an experimental, yet remarkably pleasing, dialogue. As the project’s website promises, it’s “Baroque meets the Orient.”
The collaboration is rooted in a historical encounter: the meeting between Saint Francis of Assisi and Sultan Malik al-Kamil during the Fifth Crusade in . Eight centuries later, that gesture of openness and mutual respect serves as the creative spark for this musical conversation – a meeting not of faiths or institutions, but of human voices and shared artistic ground.
“Our history is marked by crusades, wars, displays of power, and mistrust,” the project materials state. “We must never gloss over or omit that reality, for it shapes who we are now. The encounter on this album centres togetherness and the age-old desire for peace. Music is not an ornament or decoration. Music is the dialogue.”
The album draws from ancient sources, including the Laudario di Cortona and the works of Polish musician Ali Ufki (Wojciech Bobowski). New compositions weave together Persian, Ottoman, and early Western Baroque traditions. Under the artistic direction of Kiya Tabassian and the Steenbrink sisters, the music becomes a living dialogue – a conversation of timbres and histories that prioritizes listening over division and resonance over conflict.
Holland Baroque and Constantinople are both known for their inventive reimagining of the baroque repertoire and their embrace of intercultural encounters. This project continues a creative lineage for Holland Baroque, following previous releases like Silk Baroque, Telemann Polonoise & Brabant 1653 (), Minne (), Bachs Königin (), and the EP Metamorphosis ().
The album features compositions by Didem Bașar, Dimitrius Cantemir, Judith Steenbrink, Tineke Steenbrink, Kiya Tabassian, and Ali Ufki. Tracks include “Echoes of the Throne Room” (orchestrated by Judith Steenbrink), “Frate Vento,” “Heaven lives in the other,” “Welcome,” “Angelus Bells” (also orchestrated by Judith Steenbrink), “Muhayyer Semai” (again orchestrated by Steenbrink), “Walking in the Desert,” and “Bood Amma Naboud” (orchestrated by Judith Steenbrink).
The project’s genesis dates back to , when Tineke Steenbrink first encountered Kiya Tabassian and Constantinople in Schaffhausen, Switzerland. Invited to participate in a program based on the works of Johann Sebastian Bach () and Omar Khayyam (), Steenbrink was struck by the “softness and power of Kiya’s voice, and the blending of baroque instruments with the kanun and the setar.” She described being “completely enthralled by how the colours of Constantinople’s instruments found their way into Bach’s works and how wonderfully Kiya’s compositions, based on texts by Khayyam, complemented Bach’s music.”
Dialogos isn’t simply a musical journey; it’s an invitation to conversation, a contemporary echo of a centuries-old encounter. It’s a reminder that music, at its core, is a form of dialogue – a coming together of worlds, where ancient traditions meet and resonate, and where shared freedom can be found not in conflict, but in the human capacity to listen and connect. The album is available on PENTATONE in physical and digital formats, with streaming options also available.