Handel’s cantata Apollo & Dafne was written in Venice when he was just 24 years old. It tells the story of Apollo’s vanity as he suggests that even Cupid’s bow is no match for his own. Challenging Apollo’s boastfulness, Cupid shoots his arrows and Apollo falls prey to rapturous yearnings for Dafne. She spurns his advances and, in a desperate effort to escape, is transformed into a laurel tree.

The Pythagorean theory of Musica Universalis ("The Harmony of the Spheres"), built on the premise that music was a central force in the creation of Earth, is given rapturous credence in Handel’s setting of the Ode for Saint Cecilia’s Day, an exquisite Restoration period verse by John Dryden, England’s first Poet Laureate. Arias in praise of flutes, violins, trumpets, organs, and above all the power of harmony make this an absolutely beautiful testament of music's charms!