Alkemie presents “Call Me Marie: Fables from Marie de France”
Alkemie continues its 2022-2023 season with a new program based on the fables told by a 12th-century woman who pen-named herself “Marie de France.” Created and performed in collaboration with the Grammy-nominated duo Chapter House, this English-language version of her tales is sure to delight children and adults alike.
Alkemie and Chapter House will regale listeners with tales of love, magic, and cautionary wisdom, punctuated by music from the court of Eleanor of Aquitaine as well as from Harley Ms. 978, a 13th-century English source of Marie’s fables as well as the only extant version of the famous round “Sumer Is Icumen In.”
This concert will be performed live in NYC on Saturday, January 14 at 3:00 p.m. at The Brick Church; it will also premiere online on Saturday, February 18 at 7:30 p.m. and be available on-demand through February 28. For tickets and more information, please visit www.alkemie.org.
About Alkemie
Alkemie exists to explore and share the life-affirming and alternative perspectives to be experienced in the sounds of centuries past. Comprised of singer-performers playing over a dozen instruments (including vielles, harps, psaltery, gittern, recorders, douçaines, and percussion), the ensemble has a particular interest in the porous boundaries between the court and folk music of the Medieval period. Grounded in historical performance practice and fed by a love of experimentation, Alkemie’s performance on the Indianapolis Early Music Festival in June 2018 was lauded as “enchanting” and “indicating [the] future health of the field of early music.”
Founded in 2013, Alkemie is based in Brooklyn and also performs nationally; since 2018 they have maintained a partnership with the Medieval Studies program at Fordham University. In addition to growing a series in NYC, Alkemie has been presented by the Amherst Early Music Festival, Arizona Early Music Society, Cambridge Society for Early Music, Capitol Early Music Series, Five Boroughs Music Festival, Johns Hopkins Program in Arts, Humanities & Health, Music Before 1800, and the European Early Music Network virtual Early Music Day festival. Alkemie also curated, recorded, and composed the music for the videogame Pentiment.
This season, Alkemie looks forward to debuting new programs featuring a collaboration with the Grammy-nominated duo Chapter House featuring 12th-century repertoire and the fables of Marie de France (“Call Me Marie” – live in NYC and virtual); an indie-rock troubadour collaboration with Charles Mueller and his band table tennis (“Fine Companion” – live in NYC); and a collaboration with medieval luminary and composer Shira Kammen that focuses on the works of Guillaume DuFay (“Awesome is this Place” – live in NYC and virtual).
