The cloister of the Abbey de Neumünster and the église Saint-Jean in Luxembourg-Grund will be the setting for three nights of Baroque music before Easter Sunday on the occasion of the 7th edition of the Passions and Lamentations festival, organised by the cantoLX Luxembourg vocal ensemble and the Abbey de Neumünster, which will offer three exclusive concerts around the theme of mourning during Holy Week.

The concert on Holy Thursday (24 March) with Luxembourg soprano Véronique Nosbaum and the Italian tenor Peter de Laurentiis, accompanied by Karl Nyhlin (theorbo) and Frank Agsteribbe (harpsichord), will be devoted to the work of Claudio Monteverdi (1567-1643), one of the premier composers of the Italian Baroque opera. The myth of Orpheus, best known in the version of the opera Orfeo by Monteverdi, is presented in works by Domenico Belli, Giulio Caccini and other Italian composers.

The second concert of the festival is a traditional instrumental concert: Joshua Cheatham and Nicholas Milne will perform on Good Friday (25 March) pieces (for viola da gamba) by Marin Marais and Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe - revealed music and immortalised by the film Tous les matins du monde by Alain Corneau.

At the final concert on Easter Saturday (26 March) cantoLX and Frank Agsteribbe will perform, alongside other singers and instrumentalists from Luxembourg and the Greater Region, the Oratorio per la Settimana Santa, undoubtedly one of the premier oratorios in history, attributed to Luigi Rossi, a Neapolitan composer of the early 17th century. This musical dialogue consists of characters-soloists like Pilate, il Demonio and Vergine, to introduce the public to the 17th century in the history of the Passion of Jesus.

This cycle of top-flight baroque concerts offers the public a rare opportunity to discover the repertoire written for Holy Week in appropriate locations.

The concerts on all three days start at 20:15. Tickets cost €20/person per concert (€50 for 3 concerts) and ar available from www.neimenster.lu  or tel: 262052-444.