11th Sligo Festival of
BAROQUE
MUSIC
FRI 27- MON 30 OCTOBER 2006
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| La Serenissima | ||
La Serenissima was formed in 1994 for a performance of Antonio Vivaldi’s La Senna festeggiante (RV 693) and ten years later, has firmly established itself as one of the leading exponents of the music of Antonio Vivaldi and his Italian contemporaries. Since the first CD release in 2003, La Serenissima has been universally applauded by publications such as Gramophone Magazine, The Sunday Times, BBC Music Magazine, Diapason, Fanfare Magazine, American Record Guide, The Independent, The Strad and the Evening Standard for its performances and recordings on the AVIE label. Whilst works like The Four Seasons form an important part of La Serenissima’s repertoire, (one performance being described by The Independent as ‘bouncily eager to entertain, astonish and delight,’) La Serenissima pride themselves on bringing works seldom heard to the concert platform, including Vivaldi’s Ottone in Villa (RV 729), Giustino (RV 724), Tito Manlio (RV 717), Tremori al braccio (RV 799), the violin sonata (RV 798), the Concerto fatto per la Solennità della S. Lingua di S. Antonio in Padova, 1712 (RV 212) and the two double violin concerti from his manuscript set ‘La Cetra’ (RV 520 & 526). Works by other composers include Albinoni’s Il Nascimento dell’Aurora, and extracts from one of Antonio Caldara’s huge Christmas cantatas. La Serenissima has appeared at many of the UK’s leading festivals and venues including South Bank Early Music Festival, Spitalfields, Warwick, Lichfield and the Beverley Early Music Festivals, York Early Music Festival, Cambridge Summer Music, St George’s Bristol and Snape Maltings. They have also appeared in Italy, Germany, Denmark, Belgium and most recently Mexico, performing in Mexico City and the Festival Cervantino (Leon and Guanajuato) to great acclaim. They have performed for BBC Radio 3 on numerous occasions. 2005 sees the release of their third disc for AVIE records, Music for the Chapel of the Pietà, coinciding with a promotional tour of England. The whole of this record was selected by British Airways to be played on its in-flight entertainment classical channel. Two recordings are scheduled for Autumn/Winter 2005/6. The first is a record of Vivaldi’s ‘Elvira’ cantatas (RV 654, 680 & 799) for Linn Records whilst the second larger project is the first of three charting the development of the North Italian violin concerto for AVIE records. Both programmes will tour in 2006. |
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| Kate Hearne | ||
| Kate Hearne is currently based in Sweden, where she has just completed her double Masters in recorder and Baroque cello performance at Stockholm's Royal College of Music. Her teachers there included recorder virtuoso Dan Laurin and Chrichan Larson. Kate performs regularly with the Irish Baroque Orchestra and the Britten-Pears Baroque Orchestra, and she has also performed with the European Baroque Academy of Ambronay and the Drottningholm Baroque Ensemble in Sweden. As a recorder player, Kate is in regular demand as both a soloist and chamber musician, and she has given many performances throughout Europe, the USA and Canada. In September 2005, she was awarded first place in the Montréal International Recorder Competition, and over the past year she has also received awards from the Vadstena Akademien, Kungliga Musikaliska Akademien and the Irish Arts Council. Kate is keen to promote early music awareness among young people, and she is currently involved in several education projects in Ireland. | ||
| Maya Homburger | ||
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| Born and educated in Zurich, Switzerland, Maya Homburger moved to England in 1986 to join John Eliot Gardiner’s English Baroque Soloists, Trevor Pinnock’s The English Concert and other period instrument groups. Ever since meeting the composer and solo bassist Barry Guy - on the occasion of an extended concert tour with Christopher Hogwood’s Academy of Ancient Music - she has devoted her time between managing his London Jazz Composers Orchestra, running their CD label MAYA recordings and developing her own personal style on the baroque violin, specialising more and more in chamber music and solo performance. She is leader of the groups The Chandos Baroque Players and Trio Virtuoso. In 1993 she recorded the twelve fantasies for solo violin by G.Ph.Telemann and in 1995 the six sonatas for violin and harpsichord by J.S. Bach together with Malcolm Proud. Having been invited to play Telemann for the Jazz Festival in Rive de Gier (France) she shared the concert with Barry Guy combining baroque and new compositions and improvisations. For this occasion they commissioned Buxton Orr and Giles Swayne to write pieces for baroque violin and double bass. Other new works in her repertoire include Barry Guy’s compositions Celebration for solo violin, Ceremony for violin and tape and the duo Slow right arm by Roger Marsh for baroque violin and double bass. From 1996 to 2004 Barry Guy and Maya Homburger lived in Ireland where they contributed to both the early as well as the contemporary music scene. Since 2005 they have settled in Switzerland | ||
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The German label ECM has released the first CD of the Duo Homburger/Guy called “Ceremony” with works by Barry Guy and H.I.F.Biber for baroque violin and double bass. A solo violin CD with Bach’s g minor sonata and b minor partita as well as a new composition by Barry Guy , and a new Duo CD with guest artist Pierre Favre (percussion) can be found on the Maya label. |
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| Malcolm Proud | ||
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| Harpsichordist and organist Malcolm Proud was born in Dublin. Having graduated from Trinity College, Dublin with a B.Mus. a Danish Government scholarship enabled him to study at the Conservatory in Copenhagen. After a further year of study with Gustav Leonhardt in Amsterdam the Sweelinck Conservatoire awarded him his Performer's Diploma. In 1982 he won first prize at the Edinburgh International Harpsichord Competition having been a finalist in the 1980 Bruges International Harpsichord Competition
He has toured worldwide performing with John Dornenburg, the Chandos Baroque Players, Maya Homburger, the English Baroque Soloists, the E.U. Baroque Orchestra, the Gabrieli Consort and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment among others. His most recent international appearances were at the David Oistrakh Festival in Pernu, Estonia and in the Wagner Hall in Riga, Latvia. Malcolm Proud is a member of the period instrument ensembles Convivium and Camerata Kilkenny and has performed with soloists Gustav Leonhardt, Marcel Ponseele, Wilbert Hazelzet, Maya Homburger, Elizabeth Wallfisch, Isabelle Poulenard, John Elwes, Michael George, Monica Huggett, Steven Isserlis, Sarah Cunningham, Lisa Beznosiuk, Pavlo Beznosiuk, Rachel Brown, Julia Dickson, John Dornenburg, and Richard Tunnicliffe. Malcolm seems incapable of playing other than insightfully well, is always well prepared and self-effacing, a servant of the music he performs. |
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| Sarah Cunningham | ||
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| Sarah Cunningham began her viol studies in 1969 in Boston where as a young player she was described as "one of the most satisfying players of anything in the area." She then went on to work with Wieland Kuijken at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. In 1981 she moved to London where she was active as a soloist and chamber musician and won world-wide recognition for her eloquent, expressive and communicative playing.
She was a founder-member, with baroque violinist Monica Huggett, of the acclaimed Trio Sonnerie, with which she has made many recordings and toured on three continents. Since moving to West Cork, Ireland, in 1999, Sarah Cunningham has been in demand as a soloist and chamber musician throughout Ireland. She held the professorship in viola da gamba at the Hochschule fuer Kuenste, Bremen from 1990-2000. She now teaches privately in London and Ireland, and is the Artistic Director of the East Cork Early Music Festival Sarah has a large discography, is remarkable to watch as well as listen to. A performer of intense musicality with a seemingly effortless technique. |