The monk Johannes Caioni (1629/1630 - 1687) was a forerunner of the Enlightenment era in Transylvania. In 1652 he received a music collection from his teacher as a reward for his good performances. Caioni receives the collection in incomplete form and took over the task of adding compositions, an activity that he continued until 1671. The collection  became known as the Caioni Codex.

The Caioni Codex portrays the very broad musical interests of the prosperous and cosmopolitan Transylvania at that time. It consists of an extensive and varied collection of no fewer than 346 (!) pieces.

However, it is not just about the amount of compositions per se, but rather about a number of beautiful pieces with virtuoso use of the (instrumental) parts, through colourful compositional techniques.

An oasis for Black Pencil for the development of the new ‘COME OUT, CAIONI! ’ program.

COME OUT, CAIONI! takes a selection from the music of the Caioni Codex as a guideline: motets by the great masters Claudio Monteverdi and Orlando di Lasso, secular songs and smashing Romanian folk dances. The choice of repertoire is based on the potential for sound variation and difference in tempo, as well as the character and popularity of the selected works. These works served as inspiration to nowadays composers for the creation of new music, specially written for this concert programme.

Over the centuries, Transylvania has been inhabited by Romanians, Hungarians, Germans, Serbs, Slovaks, Gypsy's and others. It has long been a centre for folk music from all these different cultures. This phenomenon is also reflected in the Caioni Codex; 20 pieces of folk dance music appear in the collection. We have made a selection from our top 4. The arrangement are based on the use of rhythm and groove, very high and very low flutes, from garklein to sub-contrabass, use of flexible moods, sometimes delicate and virtuoso, another moments coarse and massive.

•     Music from the 16th and 17th centuries (Hungarian and Romanian traditional  songs & dances, Monteverdi, Orlando di Lasso. )

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