Ceruleo

Ceruleo are playing at the National Centre for Early Music on Thursday 10 December, as part of the York Early Music Christmas Festival. The whole evening is built around the music of Barbara Strozzi, one of the greatest composers of the 17th century and the most published composer of secular song of her time. The programme focuses on passion and desire — for love and longing, as an answer to life's questions or as relief from life's burdens — and pairs a selection of her finest works with instrumental pieces by her contemporaries.

The concert sits within the York Early Music Christmas Festival, which was founded in 1997 to introduce audiences to the wealth of music associated with Advent, Christmas and Epiphany, from the Medieval to the Baroque, intertwined with the sagas, stories and tales of the north. It's one of the city's long-running festive traditions, and this particular night falls right into that window.

The venue is the National Centre for Early Music, based in the medieval, Grade I listed St Margaret's Church in the heart of York. The church was converted and restored in 2000 thanks to a National Lottery grant, and it seats up to 180, so it's a relatively small, focused room for a concert like this.

It runs from 6.30pm to around 7.45pm on Thursday 10 December, at St Margaret's Church, Walmgate, York, YO1 9TL. Reserved seating is £25, or £23 if you book in advance, and under 35s pay £10.