Member
Contact Information
http://www.OrchestraOfNewSpain.org
Location
Dallas, Texas
Early Music Skills & Interests
Early Music Affiliations
Music/Artistic Director, Opera Director
Biography
Grover Wilkins is Artistic Director and founder of the Dallas based Orchestra of New Spain, a historical instrument orchestra specializing in the music of the Spanish 18th century brought to light by his ground-breaking research. His critical editions, based on major manuscript sources in Spanish court and cathedral archives, are the basis for these concerts. Selections of this repertory were recorded with the Orchestra of New Spain, Madrid Barroco (his madrid-based baroque orchestra) and with the Orquesta y Coro de Radiotelevisión Español. His orchestration of 19th c. composer Ramón Carnicer’s opera Elena y Costantino premièred in Madrid’s Teatro Real, March 2005. He has worked with Mexican, Cuban and Bolivian musicologists to add more IberAmerican baroque to the Orchestra's repertory, as well as performing in prestigious festivals in Mexico and Bolivia. Opera productions performed in Dallas Moody Performance Hall include revivals of zarzuelas of Sebastián Durón and José de Nebra, the italianate opera Achille in Sciro of Francisco Courcelle ( 2018) and currently Duron’s Love Conquers Impossible Love
He curates an annual season of 8 repertories of Spanish baroque and renaissance choral and orchestral music, and occasionally works of earlier and later periods. His early interest in 20th century and American music informs at last one annual repertory. Recent years have featured Medieval works of Christian, Sephardi and Islamic cultures known as ‘La Convivencia.’
Recordings on Dorian include Madrid 1752: Sacred Music from the Royal chapel of Spain, and Francisco Courcelle’s Masses for Celebration.
In 2017 Maestro Wilkins was knighted as an Oficial de la Orden de Isabel la Católica by King Felipe VI of Spain for his service to Spanish music and culture.
