Ah, Venice! Canals, gondolas, piazzas, blown glass, carneval ... and music.

Venice has been an important center of music for some 400 years, but never more so than during the Baroque when its composers — Monteverdi, Gabrieli, Cavalli, Vivaldi — ruled the European musical world.

Tomorrow, the Honolulu Chamber Music Series will present Interpreti Veneziani ("Venetian Interpretations"), a chamber ensemble that specializes in playing Baroque music on Baroque instruments. It's the first of four spring concerts in the HCMS series; we'll consider all four.

INTERPRETI VENEZIANI

Formed in 1987, Interpreti Veneziani has issued 16 CDs on the Rivo Alto label and is a popular group in Venice, their home base, where they perform regularly at San Vidal Church, Vivaldi's old stomping grounds.

Interpreti Veneziani concerts attract more than 60,000 season subscribers and are listed among Venice's tourist attractions. The group has also performed worldwide, including in Japan, Australia, Central America and North Africa, as well as Europe.

Until now, Americans have never had the opportunity to hear them live: this tour is their first in the United States.

Interpreti Veneziani makes a conscious effort to revive the glory of Venice's past, celebrating its music and evoking its unique atmosphere, even far from home, citing "the silence of the lagoon and the romanticism of the city."

Tomorrow's program is expected to include Baroque works by Corelli from Rome, Marin Marais from France, and, of course, two by Vivaldi, Venice's own. But it also includes works from the 19th and 20th centuries by Austrian-American violinist Fritz Kreisler, Norwegian Johan Halvorsen and Spaniard Pablo de Sarasate, all with intriguing connections to Baroque traditions.

Venice is only one of the great musical cities, however, and the Honolulu Chamber Music Series will present two more this season: Paris and New York.

PARISII QUARTET

Paris in springtime arrives in March with the Parisii Quartet, created in 1981 by four students of the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique, all of whom had won first prizes in chamber music competitions.

Their announced program includes quartets and quintets by Tailleferre, Ravel and Hahn, as well as a rare treat: Faure's "La bonne chanson," a song cycle for baritone, piano, and string quartet, with Jerome Correas (baritone) and Emmanuel Stosser (piano). Faure's work, a setting of nine poems by the symbolist Paul Verlaine and one of the finest of French cycles, appears only infrequently on American programs.

HCMS is also bringing in two ensembles from New York: the Claremont Trio in April, and the Anonymous 4 in February. Perhaps it is just coincidence that the two groups from ancient musical centers are all-male, and that the two groups from the newest musical center are all-female.

NEW YORK TRIO, QUARTET

The Claremont Trio, named after a street in New York, was formed in 1999 by twins Emily (violin) and Julia (cello) Bruskin with their pianist friend Donna Kwong. The newest of this spring's four groups, the Claremont Trio has issued two CDs and have a third on the way. Their literature highlights performances of 20th and 21st century works, one of which has been included on their program, a string trio by Castelnuovo-Tedesco sandwiched between works by Beethoven and Brahms.

Possibly the best known of this spring's groups, Anonymous 4 is a vocal quartet named after one of the most important extant treatises about medieval music, collected in the 19th century by French musicologist Charles-Edmond-Henri Coussemaker.

Formed in 1986, Anonymous 4 creates its own, historically informed transcriptions and has made its reputation performing medieval music with a distinctive atmosphere.

"Our ideal medieval concert program is not too long ... without intermission, unbroken by applause, and held together by a single theme: a saint, a feast day, a liturgical service, a single manuscript, or a literary idea," the group notes, in its background materials. "We interweave chant and polyphonic music, as well as spoken or sung narrative, to create a dramatic unity from many short works."

In the past several years, Anonymous 4 has expanded its repertoire to include British and American folk music from the 18th to 20th centuries, and the group acknowledges the difference in tone: "Our American shows are much different in mood than are our medieval programs. They are much more 'outgoing' in nature. We encourage applause (during them)."