The Pratum Integrum orchestra performs on authentic instruments. The Latin name translates as "unmown meadow" and refers to their broad-ranging repertoire from the Baroque and Classical periods, about which little is known today. This is the only orchestra in Russia in which all the sections of historic instruments are represented: strings, wind and percussion - and, moreover all the instruments were made in the 18th and 19th centuries or copied from period pieces. Pratum Integrum’s performances are a careful recreation using original treatises, primary sources and eye-witness accounts by contemporaries.
The orchestra was established in Moscow in 2003 with sponsorship from the company Essential Music, immediately gaining a reputation as an extraordinary, outstanding and highly professional ensemble of musicians with a predilection for fast tempi and vivid, fresh interpretations. Since then, the orchestra has played more than two hundred compositions for the Russian public, among them recently discovered pieces by Russian composers, once performed at the Imperial Court concerts - French music, which delighted Louis XIV and Louis XV, overtures by Telemann, which were very popular throughout Germany in the 18th century.
Using authentic performance techniques, Pratum Integrum has played concerts with leading European musicians and specialists in the field including Trevor Pinnock (UK), Sigiswald and Wieland Kuijken (Belgium), Alfredo Bernardini (Italy), Paul Esswood (UK), Simone Kermes (Germany), Christophe Rousset (France), Philippe Jaroussky (France) and Paolo Grazzi (Italy) among others.
Pratum Integrum has taken part in the Russian premiere of Lully’s Ballet des Saisons, a unique performance of Fomin’s melodrama Orpheus (with the Horn Orchestra of Russia) and concert performances of such operas as Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice, Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas and Traetta’s Antigone.
The orchestra pays great attention to sacral music; it introduced the Russian public to a historically accurate version of Mozart’s Requiem, participated in a production of Bach’s Johannes Passion, Bach’s Mass in B Minor and in the Russian premiere of Gebel’s Johannes Passion.
Pratum Integrum has participated in several prominent international festivals such as Tage Alter Music (Regensburg, 2006), Musica Antiqua (Bruges, 2006), Nordlysfestivalen (Tromsø, 2009), Early Music (St Petersburg, 2009–2011) and the Magdeburger Telemann-Festtage (2010).
Pratum Integrum performs without a conductor or under the direction of guest maestri. From the very outset, the cellist Pavel Serbin has been the orchestra’s Artistic Director, while violinist Sergei Filchenko has been its Concert Master. Leading Pratum Integrum performers also continue their solo careers, performing in Russia and abroad. One of them is the brilliant violinist and countertenor Dmitry Sinkovsky.
The orchestra has recorded more than fifteen albums for the Caro Mitis label. Among them are monograph albums featuring names known only by music scholars until recently - Tietz, Rosetti, Wölfl and Platti.
