Across four thoughtfully curated concerts in Canberra and Sydney, Salut! Baroque – led by artistic directors Sally Melhuish and Tim Blomfield – will trace the ways in which composers of the 17th and 18th centuries negotiated the competing demands of inspiration and authority.

These were artists who pushed musical form into bold new territory, yet they often had to temper their creativity to satisfy monarchs, courts and church hierarchies. Their music still carries the drama of that tension: light and shade, elegance and fury, reverence and rebellion.

Salut! Baroque. Photo supplied

Concert 1: Concord of Sweet Sounds

Taking its cue from Shakespeare – who wrote that those unmoved by music were “fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils” – Concord of Sweet Sounds unfolds as a survey of the baroque’s emotional spectrum, illuminating how composers harnessed melody to amplify theatricality, express devotion or voice longing.

Presented at Wesley Church, Forrest (30 January) and in the Barnet Long Room of Customs House at Sydney’s Circular Quay...