The early music community is not as small or incestuous as it once was: none the less, the 29th York Early Music Festival celebrates the virtue of keeping things in the family. The theme this year is musical dynasties, such as the Visconti dukes, who were pretty ruthless in their domination of northern Italy, yet had a surprisingly sophisticated taste in music. The excellent young New England vocal group Liber unUsualis presented a sublime programme of the fiercely intricate counterpoint the Duke of Milan might have unwound to after a hard day's bloodthirsty politicking.

More immediately accessible was the Iberian flavour of events staged in York Minster. The Sixteen provided a ravishing account of Victoria's Requiem of 1603 - an astonishing starburst of late-Renaissance vocal writing in which the ancient harmonic elements begin shearing apart in a great, polyphonic supernova.

The Birmingham-based chamber choir Ex Cathedra is renowned for its exploration of Latin-American baroque, and set the Minster Chapter House ringing to some exuberant oddities by the Bolivian composer Juan de Araujo. These included a stomping, castanet-accompanied piece likening the birth of Christ to a bullfight, and the whooping number Ay Andar! whose text translates as "Hey! Come on shake those tambourines!"

Perhaps it was fitting, therefore, that the festival should promote its first ever concert at the Salvation Army Citadel. The Academy of Ancient Music filled General Booth's barracks with concertos from successive generations of Bachs, of which the highlight was CPE Bach's bizarre D minor Concerto for Harpsichord, which soloist Richard Egarr introduces as "crazy, avant garde, off-the-wall". Egarr's playing was pretty tumultuous, and not helped by tuning problems that were exacerbated by hot, humid weather. Who knows what Johann Sebastian would have made of it; but you can almost see the old man shaking his head and saying: "I'm sorry son, but that's just noise."

· The festival continues until July 15. Box office: 01904 658338.