Its days as an opera house finally came to an end in bombing near the end of World War II, but it re-opened as a four-hall concert venue in 1984. The Berliner Tage für Alte Musik sees a mixture of concerts, workshops and an opportunity to buy early instruments beginning at 5:00 pm on the Friday evening when recorder player Erik Bosgraaf plays a selection of seventeenth-century works for solo recorder from Jacob van Eyck’s Der Fluyten Lust-hof.

Later that evening Ensemble Estro Cromatico make a musical journey from Venice to Naples. It includes Stefano Rossi and Mónika Tóth (violins), Eva Soloa (cello) and Davide Pozzi (harpsichord) directed by recorder player Marco Scorticati, and performs music by Andrea Falconiero, Dario Castello, Antonio Vivaldi and Alessandro Scarlatti. Involving the next generation in early music, Ensemble Woodblock begin the Saturday morning with a concert for children aged five and upwards.

That afternoon, brothers Piet and Wieland Kuijken use a concert of music for viola da gamba and harpsichord and music from the time of Louis XIV in France to explore one of the oldest questions in composition: is it essentially a game of melody or of harmony?. Later that afternoon harpsichordist Bob van Asperen looks at Spanish music in the Froberger manuscript of the Berlin Sing-Akademie, weaving together works by Antonio de Cábezon, Domenico Scarlatti and Johann Jacob Froberger.

In the evening there is a programme of scenes from the Hamburg opera, devised by Peter Huth and drawing on music by Telemann and Keiser, performed by Salto Vocale under Florian Heyerick. Sunday evening sees the return of Ensemble Cromatico with Marco Scorticati and soprano Mária Zádori in concert entitled “Salve regina” that, includes music by Mancini, Handel and Vivaldi. There are also a variety of workshops, including those given by Erik Bosgraaf, Bob van Asperen and Wieland Kuijken. Further details from www.berlinaltemusik.com