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Forthcoming PerformancesOperas | Harpsichord Recitals | Organ Recitals OperasOnly historically-inspired stagings of early opera will be listed. Please let me know of any that I have missed.
Handel. Orlando. Internationale Händel-Festpiele Göttingen, 2-12 May 2008. Details. Stage direction and choreography by Catherine Turocy, with members of the New York Baroque Dance Company. Costumes by Bonnie Kruger. Nicholas McGegan, musical director. FestspielOrchester Göttingen. Orlando: William Towers, countertenor; Angelica: Dominique Labelle, soprano; Medoro: Diana Moore, mezzo-soprano; Dorinda: Susanne Rydén, soprano; Zoroastro: Wolf Matthias Friedrich, bass. Handel. Radamisto (first version, April 1720). Karlsruhe Handel Festival, Badisches Staatstheater. 20 February 2009. Music: Peter Van Heyghen, Deutsche Händel Solisten. Stage Director & Choreographer: Sigrid T'Hooft. Costumes: Ute Frühling. Stage Design: Christian Floeren. Baroque staging with candle lighting, opulent baroque costumes & stage sets, historical gesture and choreography. Lully, Cadmus et Hermoine (1673). HIP staging directed by Benjamin Lazar. Musical director: Vincent Dumestre, Le Poème Harmonique. Choreographer: Gudrun Skamletz. Cadmus: André Morsch, baritone; Hermione: Claire Lefiliâtre, soprano; Charite / Melisse: Isabelle Druet, mezzo-soprano; Amour / Pales: Camille Poul, soprano; Arbas / Pan: Arnaud Marzorati, baritone; Nourrice / Echion: Jean-François Lombard, haute-contre. Versailles, Autumn 2008. Details. Operatic training and performance workshop at Royaumont. Opera Restor'd Forthcoming Performances (UK) - Current productions include:
Peter Holman, Musical Director; Jack Edwards, Artistic Director / Stage Director; Robin Linklater, Associate Designer; John Flinders, Assistant Musical Director. Biographies. Harpsichord Recitals of NoteThe Harpsichord Situation in North America Most harpsichord recitals, whether on modern or antique instruments, sound terrible, for a number of reasons. First, the world is swamped with bad instruments, which include the preponderance of harpsichords for hire. Second, many fundamentally sound instruments are too weakly voiced or adjusted and can barely be heard by the audience. Third, harpsichords often are moved to concert venues immediately before recitals and do not have time to adjust to differences in temperature and humidity. Finally, recital instruments rarely are attended to by first class tuners, and sometimes the tuners are overruled by performers with strange notions about temperament. Consequently, I will list selected forthcoming recitals in the eastern US that are likely to offer exceptional sound. The Dumont Concerts Recitals on the magnificent 1707 Dumont harpsichord and 1635 Ioannes Ruckers harpsichord at the home of the owners, Karen and Peter Flint, near Wilmington, Delaware, have become annual events. Tickets are available from the Delaware Theatre Company, (302) 594-1100, fax (302) 594-1107. See the Brandywine Baroque website for details. 2008 Schedule: Kenneth Gilbert, 20 April at 3 pm Organ Recitals of NoteThe Organ Situation in North America While organs based on designs from the baroque era are much easier to find in North America than they were a few years ago, they still represent only a tiny percentage of the pipe organs. Large organs almost invariably are purchased by churches. Unless a church has a forceful music director who specializes in early music, the directors usually select a modern instrument with electro-pneumatic action, electric stops, high wind pressure and equal temperament. As for small organs, the diversity of "off the shelf" models seems to be improving. The proliferation of early music groups must have led to a significant increase in demand for continuo organs. The most interesting project now underway in the US is the construction in Rochester, New York of an organ based on the best preserved northern European organ of the late 18th Century, the 1776 Casparini organ in Vilnius, Lithuania. For details, see issue 2 of Resonance (pdf). This is a collaborative project between the Eastman School of Music and the GOArt Organ Research workshop in Göteborg. The American builders participating in the reference group for the project are Steve Dieck of C.B. Fisk, George Taylor of Taylor and Boody, Paul Fritts of Pasi Organ Builders, and Bruce Fowkes of Richards Fowkes & Co. The new organ will be inaugurated in Christ Church in 2008 and named the Craighead-Saunders Organ. Details. The ELPF Bach Organ Project: Taylor & Boody will build an organ after the 3-manual, 53-stop, 1743-46 Hildebrandt organ in Naumburg [photos] for the forthcoming multi-building Constellation Center at Kendall Square, Cambridge, MA (next to M.I.T.). The Constellation Center will also include the Odeon, a baroque opera house with an historical shutter-and-groove scenery system, and a film theater with one of the finest surviving Wurlitzer theater organs. Another recent Taylor & Boody project is the 35-stop, meantone organ (photo) with split accidentals for the Yale Institute of Sacred Music at Marquand Chapel, 409 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT. Forthcoming concerts on the Yale meantone organ and a lecture of interest: Sunday, April 13, 2008, 8pm: William Porter performs music of Buxtehude, Bruhns and an improvisation. In addition, the Eastman School of Music has installed a newly-restored, historic, full-sized Italian baroque organ in the University of Rochester's Memorial Art Gallery. An inaugural festival was held in October 2005. Details. Organ Recital - Four hands and four feet on the superb Richards Fowkes
tracker organ at St.
John's Lutheran Church, Stamford, CT, Sunday, 18 March 2007 at 4:00 pm. Jay
Peterson and Stephen Rapp, organists. Works by Bach, Buxtehude, Soler,
Mendelssohn & Schumann.
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