No; our weather cannot be called clement, not by any means. We are an island buffeted by winds coming from every direction and, for most of the year; we are baked by the sun. Extremes are never pleasant and anyone who has lived in Malta long enough is well aware of and dreads the effects of the Sirocco; the so called Rih Isfel that saturates us with hot moisture gushing out of every pore.

It is like living in a sauna without the saving grace of being able to roll in the snow to cool down like the Finns. One also has to respect the decency laws and one’s clothes, once taken off can be wrung dry. I

could go on and on about the joys of feeling just like a pressure cooker about to blow however the matter in hand is reviewing the splendiferous performance of the European Union Baroque Orchestra on Tuesday 20th. All this hoohah about the weather came up because the venue was changed to the air-conditioned Ambassador’s Hall at Auberge de Castille for the simple reason that the EUBO was never in favour of outdoor performance to start with and had had to be persuaded by the festival organisers to play in the Palace Courtyard, which, while being a lovely setting, is open to the elements and outside aural interference.

A child squealing with delight while splashing through the new fountains in St George’s Square can be heard as clear as a bell in the Palace Courtyard even when the great big doors are shut! Add that to the music coming from nearby catering establishments plus the ubiquitous fireworks and the occasional band march and the serious and proper organisation of top notch music becomes untenable.

Practically every performance in this year’s Arts Festival has been a victim to one or all of these elements and while we Maltese are so used to sound pollution in our lives that we can take them on the chin, performers from overseas are not so willing to share their music making with extraneous percussion. However the dramatic increase of humidity was the last straw that breaks the camel’s back.

I would imagine that it is our British heritage to revel in the heat. Visions of British Army officers in sharkskin dinner jackets keeping a stiff upper lip during some gubernatorial reception in impossibly high temperatures immediately spring to mind; mad dogs and Englishmen walking in the midday sun and all that. We are not in 2010 made of such stern stuff. We want our comforts and we want them now.

Therefore the transfer to the air-conditioned Auberge de Castile was inevitable. No musical instrument cares for that sort of humidity. No human being can full enjoy and appreciate a concert, no matter how rivetingly good, feeling like a wet rag that the cat dragged in. Ergo one can conclude that much as we boast about our weather, when push comes to shove we would all rather be in a cool air-conditioned room as I am now while I cogitate all this to maybe persuade the powers that be that any open air venue, even if designed by The Great Architect in the Sky himself is subject to the elements.

Maladies and Melodies was the sobriquet chosen to describe the baroque music chosen by the EUBO; some were obvious; Zelenka’s Hipocondrie a Sept Concertantes in A and Muffat’s Concerto Grosso III in E Flat subtitled Convalescenti, however the others were merely two other concerti ‘grossi’ and a Sonata; unless of course once can count ‘grosso’ as a malady too. What I found very interesting what the inclusion of the music of 18th Century Senglean composer Mikelang Vella whose Sonata no 2 for three violins and continuo was premiered in 1768 and of course by association with that long-lived and terribly grandiose prince of hypochondriacs, Fra Emmanuel Pinto de Fonseca could also be included in the maladies as this particular grandmaster regularly drank a distillation of the unique herb that he had guarded night and day on the so-called Fungus Rock in Gozo. This, or sheer pigheadedness, must have given Pinto his legendary longevity.

There was nothing very profound about the Vella piece that consisted in four very pleasant movements. Incidental music for one of Grandmaster Pinto’s ‘conversazioni’ with his court of functionaries, courtiers, ladies, clergy and maybe some foreign aristocrat or two who, a little more adventurous than most, strayed out of the usual Grand Tour circuit to visit the semi-monastic principality that by the 18th century had become the stuff of legend. The EUBO played this piece with a polish and a style that was second to none.

In fact the entire evening was second to none. Nothing can imitate or replace the authentic sound of a baroque orchestra.

The exuberance and sparkle of the scrunch-crunch of a harpsichord continuo enhanced by the theorbo which looks like a lute with an extraordinarily long fingerboard with no less than 13 stings simply colours the busily developing passages with the magnificent colours of the 18th century; Monkey’s Paw and the inevitable Puce! So used to music conjuring up pictures and atmospheres are we, possibly because of the film industry, that while listening to this flow of musically architectural wonders under the direction of a supersensitive communicator, Lars Ulrik Mortensen, I could not help thinking of how ideal Malta would be to host a baroque festival that, if organised with foresight and forethought, become the talk of civilised Europe.

Our palaces, our churches, our maisons particuliers, let alone our beloved gem of a Manoel Theatre are crying out for ensembles like the EUBO to play in them. We have it all but, per carita’, please, not in the height of summer.