Making the Music of the Past Present by Exploring Music of Scotland, Spain, France, Italy, England, the Americas and More
PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (August 15, 2023) – Chatham Baroque announces the Chatham Baroque + Renaissance & Baroque 2023-24 Concert Series, a bold and ambitious lineup of Baroque period and early music performances spanning eras, ensemble configurations, and the globe. The season makes the music of the past present by including a tantalizing mix of performances by Chatham Baroque with critically-acclaimed guest artists, as well as an amazing array of world-renowned visiting ensembles and virtuosic musicians from around the world.
The season opens on October 6 through 8 with the Art of the Trio featuring the highly regarded and accomplished Chatham Baroque members Andrew Fouts, violin, Patricia Halverson, viola da gamba, and Scott Pauley, theorbo. Held in three different venues, the program highlights the incredible talents of the ensemble’s musicians. For the annual Art of the Trio concert, Chatham Baroque reminds you that “all music was once new music.” The trio explores the idea of “modern” music for our instruments – violin, viola da gamba, and theorbo – from the 16th, 17th, 18th, and 21st centuries.
The Art of the Trio concert will cover the early innovators for the ensemble’s instruments, Diego Ortiz, Giovanni Kapsperger and Biagio Marini, the 17th-century “modern style” of Dario Castello and Isabella Leonarda, the florid “fantastic style” of Antonio Bertali, the inventive Canons of J.S. Bach’s Art of the Fugue, and conclude with 21st-century works composed specially for Chatham Baroque, including David Stock’s “For Emily.”
The Chatham Baroque season continues to present programs at concert venues across the Pittsburgh region, bringing Baroque and early music to audiences throughout the city, with performances at St. Nicholas Croatian Catholic Church, Teutonia Männerchor, Calvary Episcopal Church, Rodef Shalom’s Levy Hall, Andrew Carnegie Free Library & Music Hall in Carnegie, PA, and Hicks Memorial Chapel at Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.
2023/2024 CHATHAM BAROQUE + RENAISSANCE & BAROQUE SERIES CONCERTS
Chatham Baroque: Art of the Trio
Friday-Sunday, October 6-8, 2023
Friday Oct 6, 7:30 p.m., St. Nicholas Croatian Catholic Church, Millvale
Saturday Oct 7, 7:30 p.m., Hicks Memorial Chapel, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
Sunday October 8, 2:30 p.m., Hicks Memorial Chapel, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
Emily Norman Davidson Memorial Concert
Chatham Baroque’s Andrew Fouts (violin), Patricia Halverson (viola da gamba), and Scott Pauley (theorbo & baroque guitar) present their annual trio concert, continuing their musical exploration as a trio, showcasing their most adventurous and virtuosic music, tight ensemble playing, and mischievous sense of fun.
The Baltimore Consort: In Angel’s Wede – Music of Mary Queen of Scots
Saturday, November 18, 2023, 7:30 p.m.
Calvary Episcopal Church
With live narration by Emmy Award winner (and television and radio personality) Robert Aubry Davis, this program features Scottish, French, Italian, and English music, illustrating the different periods in the life of Mary, Queen of Scots.
The Baltimore Consort artists include:
Danielle Svonavec, soprano
Mindy Rosenfeld, winds
Mary Anne Ballard, viols
Larry Lipkis, viols and recorders
Mark Cudek, cittern
Ronn McFarlane, lute
Robert Aubry Davis, narrator
Chatham Baroque: Alegría – Music of Baroque Spain and the Americas
Saturday & Sunday, December 16-17, 2023
Saturday, December 16, 7:30 p.m., Hicks Memorial Chapel
Sunday, December 17, 2:30 p.m., Levy Hall, Rodef Shalom
Chatham Baroque’s holiday program explores music of Baroque Spain and the New World. Nell Snaidas (soprano) and Raquel Winnica Young (mezzo soprano) charm and dazzle singing in their native Spanish, extolling the joys of the season as expressed through the unique music of Hispanic colonial times.
Andrew Fouts, violin
Patricia Halverson, viola da gamba
Scott Pauley, theorbo and guitar
With special guest artists:
Nell Snaidas, soprano
Raquel Winnica Young, mezzo-soprano
Evan Few, violin
Paula Fagerberg, harp
Paul Shipper, percussion and guitar
Chatham Baroque: Through the Wood, Laddie – Music of Baroque Scotland and Acadia
Friday-Sunday, January 26-28, 2024
Friday, January 26, 7:30 p.m., Teutonia Männerchor
Saturday, January 27, 7:30 p.m., Andrew Carnegie Free Library & Music Hall in Carnegie, PA
Sunday, January 28, 2:30 p.m., Hicks Memorial Chapel, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
A unique program featuring special guests Chris Norman (wooden flutes and pipes) and Pascale Beaudin (soprano), both with roots in the Canadian Maritime provinces. The ensemble and superb guest artists bring to life a program of music ranging from Baroque Scotland to French Canadian folk tunes from the Acadian tradition.
Andrew Fouts, violin
Patricia Halverson, viola da gamba
Scott Pauley, theorbo
With special guest artists:
Pascale Beaudin, soprano
Chris Norman, wooden flutes and pipes
Apollo’s Fire: Violin Fantasy
Sunday, February 18, 2024, 4:00 p.m.
Calvary Episcopal Church
Grammy-winning ensemble Apollo’s Fire returns to the R&B stage with a new program based on Heinrich Biber’s stunning Sonatas on the Mysteries of the Rosary, along with instrumental works inspired by the baroque tradition of Stylus fantasticus (the “fantastical style”). Apollo’s Fire concertmaster Alan Choo joins with Grammy-winning harpsichordist Jeannette Sorrell, Pittsburgh favorite Andrew Fouts and a colorful ensemble of lutes, harp, cello, and lirone to present their unique interpretation of these masterworks, in celebration of their new album release.
Apollo’s Fire artists include:
Jeannette Sorrell, harpsichord, director
Alan Choo, Andrew Fouts, violin
Rebecca Reed, cello
Billy Simms, Brian Kay, plucks
Kivie Cahn-Lipman, lirone
Anna O’Connell, harp
Peter Bennett, organ
Friday & Saturday, March 15 & 16, 2024
Friday, March 15, 2024 7:30 p.m., Calvary Episcopal Church
Saturday, March 16, 2024, 7:30 p.m., Calvary Episcopal Church
Featuring Bass-Baritone Jonathan Woody singing J.S. Bach’s Cantata, Ich habe genug (BWV 82) and the joyous Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 for two violas, two violas da gamba, and continuo, this program celebrates Bach’s birthday with some of his most beloved works.
Andrew Fouts, violin
Patricia Halverson, viola da gamba
Scott Pauley, theorbo
With special guest artists:
Jonathan Woody, bass-baritone
Kathryn Montoya, oboe
Cynthia Keiko Black, violin
Rebecca Humphrey Diedrich, cello
Martha McGaughey, viola da gamba
- Tracy Mortimore, bass
Justin Wallace, harpsichord and chamber organ
Alan Lewis, organ prelude
Saturday, April 6, 2024, 7:30 p.m.
Hicks Memorial Chapel, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary
Music from courts of 17th and 18th Century Europe showing the world in which viol virtuoso and composer Marin Marais lived, and his influence on the music of Johann Sebastian Bach.
Parker Ramsay, harp and harpsichord
Arnie Tanimoto, viola da gamba
TICKETS AND SUBSCRIPTIONS
Subscriptions, which include seven concerts plus one bonus ticket are $240 ($180 with senior discount). Single tickets at Early Bird Price: $40 General Admission, $30 Senior Discount, and $20 Students. Full Price: $45 General Admission, $35 Senior Discount, and $25 Student. Full price charges are applied beginning on the Friday two weeks prior to each concert program. For more information, or to purchase subscriptions and tickets, visit https://www.chathambaroque.org/23-24-concert-series/.
SPECIAL COLLABORATIONS
Chatham Baroque is pleased to announce a special collaboration with Calvary Episcopal Church in conjunction with their program initiative for the city-wide Violins of Hope exhibition.
Hope Across the Centuries
Monday, November 6, 2023, 7:30 p.m.
Calvary Episcopal Church
Music exists only in its sounding moment—but that moment can happen again and again, across time and space, even as everything around it changes. This concert focuses on instrumental and vocal music from the Sephardic tradition and seventeenth-century Venice. Pittsburgh-based ensemble Chatham Baroque plays instruments from the Violins of Hope collection in bringing fresh life to music by the Jewish Venetian composer Salamone Rossi, including Psalm-settings for soprano and mezzo-soprano, and sonatas for two violins. Pittsburgh composer David Stock’s musical memorial, “For Emily,” rounds out the program.
Sarah Nadler, soprano
Raquel Winnica, mezzo-soprano
Andrew Fouts, Paul Miller, violin
Scott Pauley, lute, theorbo, and baroque guitar
Patricia Halverson, viola da gamba
Elizabeth Gassler, violin and cello
Alan Lewis, chamber organ
Additionally, on Friday, December 8, 2023, at 8:00 p.m., Calvary Episcopal Church and Chatham Baroque will perform George Frideric Handel’s Messiah in Pittsburgh’s only complete performance of this monumental work. Vocalists Sarah Nadler, soprano, Raquel Winnica Young, mezzo-soprano, Guy Russo, tenor, Edward Vogel, bass, and more, join the Calvary Choir and Chatham Baroque in bringing the majesty of Handel’s joyous refrains and exultant arias to audiences just in time for the holidays.
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About Chatham Baroque:
Each year, Chatham Baroque presents a series of captivating, historically informed performances, drawing from a vast repertoire of classical music styles, eras, and locales from the Medieval Period through the early 19th Century.
As one of the country’s leading period instrument ensembles and early music presenters, each season features several concerts with the distinguished Chatham Baroque ensemble with artistic directors Andrew Fouts (violin), Patricia Halverson (viola da gamba), and Scott Pauley (theorbo and baroque guitar) as well as concerts by renowned touring ensembles specializing in music of the Middle Ages, Renaissance, Baroque, and early Classical period.
Chatham Baroque concerts are performed with period instruments, which are restored or replica versions from the time when the music was written. Concerts are held in a variety of settings across Pittsburgh from churches to concert halls, and performers actively engage audiences with lively commentary and insights into the music. To learn more, please visit www.chathambaroque.org.
