FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Contact: Lisa Higgins, 610.282.WILL [9455], ext. 4?
July 21, 2014 Lisa.Higgins@pashakespeare.org
Center Valley, PA — Lauded for its “joy in music making” and “superb musicianship,” the internationally renowned Baltimore Consort will premiere a lively and entertaining program of songs and music from or inspired by Shakespeare’s plays on Monday, July 28 at 7:30pm at the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival Main Stage.
From Scotland to Seattle, the group has won accolades and fans. Founded in 1980, the group met at The Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University, in Baltimore, and has since released 16 CDs on the Dorian/Sono label. Billboard named them a Top Classical-Crossover Artist of the Year.
The group is premiering a program of music “The Food of Love: Songs for Shakespeare.” Playing on period instruments, the group combines the sultry viols, the ethereal flute, the ‘sprightly and cheerful’ cittern, and the ‘noble’ lute. The Baltimore Consort is the exact equivalent of the “exquisite consort” which entertained Queen Elizabeth upon her visit to the Earl of Hertford in September 1591.
“An ‘English Consort’ was considered Shakespeare’s stage band,” says Larry Lipkis, veteran music director of PSF’s On the Green (and its predecessor The Green Show), and a long-time member of the Baltimore Consort.
There are hundreds of references to music in the works of Shakespeare, says Lipkis, who is also composer-in-residence and director of early music at Moravian College in Bethlehem, Pa. “Shakespeare authored the lyrics to some of these songs but also incorporated popular songs known to his contemporary audiences,” Lipkis says.
The concert will include “It was a Lover and His Lasse,” “When Griping Grief,” “Where the Bee Sucks,” “Heart’s Ease,” “In Youth When I Did Love,” “Full Fathon Five,” “Fortune My Foe,” “The Willow Song,” “Kemp’s Jig” and others.
In addition to Lipkis on bass viol and Renaissance winds, the group features Mary Anne Ballard on treble and bass viols, Mark Cudek on cittern, Ronn McFarlane on the lute, Mindy Rosenfeld on flute, fife, and bagpipes, and soprano vocalist Danielle Svonavec.
All tickets are $30 and available by calling 610.282.WILL [9455] or online at www.pashakespeare.org.
Production sponsor is Lehigh Valley Business. Season Sponsor is Breslin, Ridyard, and Fadero Architects Inc.; Associate Season Sponsors are Linda Lapos and Paul Wirth, the Szarko Family, and The Harry C. Trexler Trust. Media sponsors are The Morning Call and Service Electric Cable TV & Communications.
The season continues with Lend Me a Tenor (through August 3) in repertory with Macbeth (July 17 – August 3); Cinderella (through August 2); and Shakespeare for Kids (July 23 – August 2).
Artist Bios
Mary Anne Ballard, treble viol, researches many of the Consort’s programs. She also plays with Galileo’s Daughters, Brio, Mr. Jefferson’s Musicians, and Fleur de Lys. Formerly, she directed or coached early music at the Peabody Conservatory, Princeton University, and the University of Pennsylvania, where she founded the Collegium Musicum and produced medieval music drama. She is now on the faculty of Oberlin’s summer Baroque Performance Institute. A resident of Indiana and New York City, she music-directed the Play of Daniel for 75th Anniversary of the opening of The Cloisters Museum in New York and at Trinity Wall Street Church in New York.
Mark Cudek, cittern,is Director of the Early Music program at the Peabody Conservatory, and also Artistic Director of the Indianapolis Early Music Festival. In recognition of his work as Founder/Director of the Peabody Renaissance Ensemble and also the High School Early Music Program at the Interlochen Arts Camp, Mark received from Early Music America the 2001 Thomas Binkley Award and the 2005 Award for Outstanding Contribution to Early Music Education. He has regularly performed with Apollo’s Fire, The Catacoustic Concort, and Hesperus, and, in his youth, worked as a café guitarist in the Virgin Islands.
Larry Lipkis, bass viol,is Composer-in-Residence and Director of Early Music at Moravian College in Bethlehem PA. He has also served as Director of Pinewoods Early Music Week, and is currently a Music Director for the Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival. His cello concerto, Scaramouche, appears on the Koch label, and his bass trombone concerto, Harlequin, was premiered by the Los Angeles Philharmonic to rave reviews. The trilogy was completed when his bassoon concerto Pierrot was performed by the Houston Symphony. Larry often lectures on the topic of Bach and Rhetoric, speaking at NEH Summer institutes in Leipzig in 2012 and 2014.
Ronn McFarlane, lute, has released more than 30 CDs on Dorian and Sono Luminus, including solo collections, lute songs, lute duets, music for flute & lute, Elizabethan lute music and poetry, the complete lute music of Vivaldi, and Baltimore Consort albums. In the tradition of the lutenist/composers of past centuries, Ronn has composed new music for the lute. These original compositions are the focus of his solo CD, Indigo Road, which received a Grammy Award Nomination in 2009. The CD release, One Morning, features “Ayreheart,” a new ensemble brought together to perform Ronn’s new music. Visit www.ronnmcfarlane.com.
Mindy Rosenfeld, flute, a founding member of the Baltimore Consort whose playing graced our first decade, is also a long-time member of San Francisco’s Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra. Fluent in a wide range of musical styles, she plays both wooden and modern flutes in addition to recorders, whistles, crumhorns, and early harp. Mindy actively freelances on the West Coast and is Principal Flute at the Mendocino Music Festival in her hometown. The mother of five boys, she loves dancing and tending her organic garden at home on “The Boy Farm.”
Danielle Svonavec, soprano, is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame (BS in mathematics, 1999, and MM in Voice, 2003) where she now teaches voice. While still a student, she stepped in on short notice as soloist for the Baltimore Consort’s nine-concert 1999 Christmas tour. Since then she has toured with the Consort and appeared with the Smithsonian Chamber Players, Pomerium, the South Bend Chamber Orchestra, and the South Bend Symphony. She currently serves as the Cantor for the nationally televised mass at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart at Notre Dame, and recently began teaching Middle School music at the Trinity School Greenlawn in South Bend.
The Baltimore Consort USA representative: Joanne Rile Artists Management, Inc.
PATRICK MULCAHY (Producing Artistic Director, PSF; Director, Macbeth) Since assuming leadership in 2003, Mulcahy has led PSF’s return to artistic excellence and financial stability, rebuilt the professional company of artists, and achieved increasing national recognition for the Festival. As a professional director, actor and fight director, credits include Broadway, Off-Broadway, regional theatre, television, and radio. Mulcahy has acted with Angela Basset, Peter MacNicol, Hal Holbrook, Joan Cusack, Don Cheadle, Anne Meara, Milo O’Shea, Cynthia Nixon, Tony Shaloub, Bradley Whitford, and others at the New York Shakespeare Festival, Hartford Stage, Roundabout Theatre Company, Great Lakes Theatre Festival, Syracuse Stage, and the Walnut Street Theatre. He served as a fight director for Tom Hulse and Timothy Busfield in A Few Good Men on Broadway and for Off-Broadway productions starring John Savage, John Mahoney, Marcia Gay Harden, and Patrick Dempsey. He directed Oscar nominee Vera Farmiga in The Real Thing, and, for PSF, directed Hamlet (2011), Antony and Cleopatra (2009), The Winter’s Tale (2007), Henry IV, Part I (2005), The Tempest (1999), and acted in and served as fight director for The Taming of the Shrew (1998) and Julius Caesar (1997). As head of acting at DeSales, Patrick directed ten productions for Act 1, including I Hate Hamlet, The Grapes of Wrath, The Foreigner, and The Diary of Anne Frank. He holds an MFA from Syracuse University.
