ORCAS
ISLAND
.
ORCAS ADVENTIST
FELLOWSHIP
CHURCH
107 Enchanted Forest Road
Eastsound · (360) 376-6683
please note:
Concerts at 5:00 PM
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•
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and under FREE •
SSEMF presents outstanding
early chamber music on
Orcas Island
thanks to your support.
The
Salish Sea Early Music Festival is a
501(c)3 organization and all donations
are fully tax deductible in accordance
with the law. Your donations are
welcomed at
https://www.salishseafestival.org/donate
.
✣
With special thanks
✣
to
the Orcas Adventist Fellowship Church
|
2025 Salish Sea Early
Music Festival on Orcas Island
~
Period Instrument chamber music from six centuries
on Orcas Island and around the Salish Sea ~
~ Presented in
collaboration with the Orcas Adventist Fellowship
Church ~
~
All Wednesdays at 5:00 PM
★ download updated
flyer here ~
:
Wednesday,
June 11, 2025 at 5:00
PM:
—FOLK
SONG FROM THREE CENTURIES II
Renaissance
Psalms, Scottish Baroque &
Folk
· Oleg Timofeyev,
renaissance lute, English guitar
& 7-string guitar (1820)
· Jeffrey
Cohan, renaissance,
baroque & 8-keyed flutes
(London, 1820)
Renaissance Psalms (~1620), Irish
and Scottish baroque (~1720) and
folk music as interpreted during
Beethoven's lifetime (~1820) in
part II, a 100% new program of
highly innovative renditions of
settings from three centuries
based on popular and folk music,
performed on 5 transverse flutes
and three plucked instruments.
In the early 17th century Flutist
Jacob Van Eyck and lutenist
Nicolas Vallet both wrote settings
of and variations on many of the
Psalm tunes from the Geneva
Psalter of the mid-16th century
that were widely sung in churches
100 years later. These are
juxtaposed simultaneously in a
manner that sheds new light on
early 17th-century practice.
James Oswald's "Airs for the
Seasons" consists of four
collections, one for each season,
of about 24 airs or multi-movement
suites, each dedicated to a
particular flower of the season
and radiating the charming
character of the folk melodies of
Oswald's native Scotland. The wire
strung English guitar, so rarely
to be heard today, emerged around
this time as one of the most
prominent instruments of home life
in England, and Oswald's airs
beautifully suit Oleg's instrument
made in 1767 alongside the
one-keyed baroque flute. Likewise,
settings of the popular tunes
written specifically for the
English guitar by Scotsman Robert
Bremner and others are to be
heard, following settings from
several decades earlier of Irish
and Scottish popular melodies by
Burk Thumoth and Francesco
Barsanti on baroque flute and
lute.
Finally, an Eastern European
7-string guitar made in 1820 in
Russia and an eight-keyed flute
made in London in the same year
resonate to variations on popular
tunes by Englishman Charles
Nicholson, American Joseph
Kennedy, Austrian Anton Diabelli
and other virtuoso flutists and
guitarists of Beethoven’s day.
LISTEN:
Oleg Timofeyev
and Jeffrey Cohan play Drouet's God
Save the Queen on
SoundCloud:
 17th
CenturyNicolas
Vallet
Jacob
Van Eyck
18th
Century
James
Oswald
Francesco
Barsanti
Turlough
O'Carolan
19th
Century
Anton
Diabelli
I.T.
Norton
Late
July: — THE
18TH-CENTURY HARPSICHORD
IN SPAIN
(Seattle,
Vancouver and Tacoma only - please
see those pages on our site)
· Irene
Roldàn,
harpsichord
Step into the heart of
18th-century Iberia, where the
vibrant court of Madrid stood as a
focal point for the flourishing of
the rich keyboard music of
Domenico Scarlatti, Sebastian de
Albero, Jose de Nebra, and the
Portuguese Carlos Seixas.
[only in certain locations]
Wednesday,
July 16 at 5:00 PM: — JOHANN
SEBASTIAN BACH
· Irene Roldàn,
harpsichord
· Jeffrey Cohan,
baroque flute
Spanish harpsichordist Irene Roldàn
from Basel and Jeffrey interpret
Bach's phenomenal music for flute
and harpsichord.
 
UKRAINE
Olena
Zhukova
It is a great honor to feature
Ukrainian harpsichordist Olena
Zhukova of Kyiv, Ukraine, a
leading harpsichordist and a
tireless ambassador of
early music in her country and
abroad during
this difficult period. She has
performed since the outbreak of
full-scale war in prominent
performances sponsored by
distinguished institutions all
around Ukraine, Poland, Austria,
France, Switzerland and Czech
Republic for international
festivals and in collaboration
with major artists, orchestras and
opera productions. Ms. Zhukova is
also an accomplished scholar who
published and presented more than
20 articles, while devoting
herself to her harpsichord class
and chamber music students as
Associate Professor at both the National
Music Academy of Ukraine and
the Gliére Academy of Music
(Kiev), where she founded the
harpsichord class. Recent
engagements during the past few
months alone include Bach's
Goldberg Variations in the
prestigious Organ Hall in
Lviv, Ukraine; the first major
classical performance for the
public in Chernihiv,
Ukraine since
the outbreak of war entitled French
Music in Times of War
and sponsored by the Ambassador of
France, in a newly rebuilt
performance hall in Chernihiv that
had previously been extensively
damaged by a Russian strike at the
beginning of the conflict; and an
involved program, consisting
exclusively of new music in part
composed for her by today's
Ukrainian composers, for Columbia
University’s Global Center in
Paris and its Institute
for Ideas and Imagination.
Ms.
Zhukova will appear in the
following two programs:
Dates
to be announced: —
HARPSICHORD
MYSTERY
(Seattle,
Vancouver and Tacoma only)
· Elena
Zhukova,
harpsichord
The Ukrainian harpsichordist
deciphers mysterious and elusive
rarities as well as standards for
solo harpsichord by Byrd,
Couperin, Rameau and Scarlatti
alongside Ukrainian gems including
a harpsichord sonata by Dmitry
Bortnyansky. [only in Seattle,
Vancouver and Tacoma]
Dates
to be announced: —
EUROPEAN
TOUR 1690-1790
· Elena
Zhukova, harpsichord
· Jeffrey
Cohan, baroque flute
An excursion through a century of
transformation and diversity by
decade and culture within the
baroque and classical periods,
through the perspective of composers
for harpsichord and flute from
France, Italy, Scotland, Germany and
Ukraine.
|
~
Earlier concerts this 2025
season
~
Wednesday,
January 22, 2025 at
5:00 PM: — THE
CANZONA
· Vicki
Boeckman, renaissance
recorders
· Tina Chancey,
tenor viol
· Jeffrey
Cohan, renaissance
transverse flutes
· Anna Marsh,
dulcian (renaissance bassoon)
Featuring
special guest renaissance
specialist and innovative
improviser Tina Chancey from
Hesperus in Washington, DC, this
in-depth exploration of the
Italian four-part canzona, which
blossomed in print from 1577
through the mid 1600’s, traces
its development from 1533, when
commercial music printing was in
its infancy in Europe, through
1636 at which point more
“baroque” stylistic forms such
as the sonata and the suite had
begun to emerged. Canzonas by
Florentino Maschera (1582),
Floriano Canale (1600), Giovanni
Dominico Rognoni Taegio (1605),
Antonio Troilo (1606), Giovanni
Gabrieli (1608), Girolamo
Frescobaldi (1608), Giovanni
Antonio Cangiasi (1614), Giacomo
Biumi (1624), Nicolo Corradini
(1624), Giovanni Buonamente
(1636) and others are to be
included in the program along
with examples of the earlier
French and Flemish songs of the
early 1500's that inspired them,
including well known chansons
published specifically for
instrumentalists in 1533, 1577
and 1588, among them Clement
Jannequin’s “Song of the Birds”.
Renaissance winds of three
distinct families along with the
fretted viols provide an
exciting blend and a distinct
character to each of the four
intertwining musical lines.
Wednesday,
February 26, 2025
at 5:00 PM:
— THE
CHACONNE with LES VOIX
HUMAINES
· Susie Napper,
viola da gamba & treble
viol
· Mélisande
Corriveau, viola da
gamba & pardessus de viol
· Elisabeth
Wright, harpsichord
· Jeffrey
Cohan, baroque and
renaissance flutes
Les
Voix humaines,
the widely celebrated
prize-winning duo of viols
from Montreal joins us for a
program demonstrating the
chaconne at it's most
poignant, transporting three
important works by Johann
Sebastian Bach to an entirely
new level through their own
transcriptions, and presenting
other remarkable but rarely
heard repertoire for two viola
da gambas, pardessus de viol,
flute and harpsichord.
The
hypnotic French chaconne that
developed during the reign of
Louis XIV brings the listener
from one emotional realm to
the next in a regular
procession of episodes that
transition gently in an
emotional direction or leap
suddenly with emotion and
stark contrast, now uplifting
or sad, majestic or
introspective, hopeful or
questioning. The pulse may
feel broader, then more
angular, then running with
abandon or pregnant with
poise, always cleverly
evolving in the presentation
of a musical story.
Bach
and Telemann succeed in bringing
this chaconne to a whole new
level, as we'll experience with
"Les Voix Humaines" in their
very own transcription of Bach's
Chaconne in D Minor for
2 viola da gambas, originally
for solo violin, and in the
chaconne entitled Modéré
from Telemann's Paris
Quartet No. 12 in E Minor
for flute, pardessus de viole,
viola da gamba and harpischord.
Two outstanding quartets for two
viola da gambas, flute and
harpsichord celebrating this
unusual combination of
instruments will be heard
alongside two additional
transcriptions: for flute,
pardessus de viol and
harpsichord of Bach's Organ
Trio Sonata in D Minor,
and for solo harpsichord of the
Allemande from Bach's D
Major Suite No. 6 for
solo cello.
From
the standpoint of the
Salish Sea Early Music
Festival and
as Tobias Hume asserted in
1605, "Now to use a modest
shortness, and a brief
expression of my self to all
noble spirits": Les Voix
Humaines is simply
phenomenal!
In
1676, Thomas Mace accurately
expressed their sentiments: "I
have been more Sensibly,
Fervently, and Zealously
Captivated, and drawn into
Divine Raptures, and
Contemplations, by Those
Unexpressible Rhetorical,
Uncontroulable Perswasions, and
Instructions of Musicks Divine
Language."
A perfect description of their
vision of music making, Sloane
wrote c.1794: "There must be an
Order and just Proportion,
Intricacy with Simplicity in the
Component parts, Variety in the
Mass, and Light and Shadow in
the whole, so as to produce the
varied sensations of gaiety and
melancholy, of wildness and even
surprise and wonder…"
And as Thomas Mace says in 1676:
"…When we come to be Masters… we
can command all manner of Time,
at our own Pleasures; we Then
take Liberty for Humour and good
Adornment-sake, to Break Time;
sometimes Faster, sometimes
Slower, as we perceive, the
Nature of the Thing Requires,
which…adds much Grace and Luster
to the Performance."
Wednesday,
March 12,
2025 at 5:00 PM:
—
FRENCH
BAROQUE TRIO SONATAS
with MUSICA ALTA RIPA
· Anne
Röhrig,
violin
· Bernward
Lohr, harpsichord
· Susie
Napper, viola da
gamba
· Jeffrey
Cohan, baroque
flute
French
trio sonatas and quartets
spanning more than 60 years
through the reigns of Louis
XIV and Louis V, alongside a
"Paris Quartet" written by
Georg Philipp Telemann for his
visit to Paris in 1738.
Marin
Marais (1656 – 1728)
—
Trio
C major (1682)
Jean-Baptiste Quentin, the
young (before 1690 – ca.
1742)
—
Trio
in G minor Opus 8 No. 1
(after 1729)
Louis-Gabriel Guillemain
(1705 – 1770)
—
Trio
Sonata No. 3 in D Minor
(1743)
Jean-Marie Leclair l'aîné
(1697 – 1764)
—
Violin
Sonata in A Minor
Joseph Bodin de Boismortier
(1689 – 1755)
—
Trio
Sonata Opus 37 No. 2 in e
minor (1732)
MUSICA
ALTA RIPA
Harpsichordist BERNWARD LOHR
is director of Hanover's
Musica Alta Ripa, one of
Germany's most active and
extensively recorded period
instrument ensembles. Baroque
violinist ANNE RÖHRIG, leads
the Hannoversche Hofkapelle
(the "Hanover Court
Orchestra"), another of the
premier baroque orchestras
that contributes to the
vibrant early music scene in
Hannover and Northern Germany.
“Hannover” originally evolved
from "Hohes Ufer", meaning
"high riverbank" or "Alta
Ripa" in Latin. Bernward Lohr
and Anne Röhrig are professors
at music conservatories in
both Hannover and Nuremburg,
Germany. Their more than 30
recordings have garnered many
of the most important awards
in Europe for recordings
including the Diapason Dòr,
the Cannes Classical Award,
the German Recording Critics'
Prize, and several times the
coveted Echo Klassik Award.
Both were awarded the 2002
Music Award of Lower Saxony.
Wednesday,
May 7 at 5:00 PM:
—
The
MUSIQUE DE LA CHAMBRE of
LOUIS XIV
· Caroline
Nicolas, viola da
gamba
· William
Simms, baroque
guitar
· Jeffrey
Cohan, baroque
flute
The
MUSIQUE DE LA CHAMBRE of
LOUIS XIV features music by
prominent soloists, all
composers, who frequently
played for Louis XIV,
including the king’s guitar
instructor Robert De Visée
and his Italian predecessor
Francesco Corbetta, along
with a favorite viola da
gambist at the court, Marin
Marais and his teacher
Monsieur de Sainte-Colombe,
as well as Élisabeth Jacquet
de La Guerre, a young
harpsichordist and one of
the few famous female
musicians of her time whose
playing and compositions
Louis deeply admired and
subsidized.
This program stands apart in
a variety of ways. Jeffrey
Cohan discovered the
earliest known French solo
specifically for the
transverse flute by the
king’s court music librarian
André Danican Philidor
L'Aisné in a relatively
unknown and as yet
unpublished manuscript which
was prepared in 1695 by
Philidor himself as a
present from Louis XIV for
the Duke of Bavaria. Marin
Marais asserted that his
music for viola da gamba
might be played on the
transverse flute, as is to
be realized in a Suite from
his first book of pieces for
viola da gamba. Similarly a
sonata by Jacquet de La
Guerre assumes new resonance
in our realization for
transverse flute, gamba and
guitar. Caroline Nicolas and
William Simms will perform
solos for viola da gamba and
guitar by De Visée, Corbetta
and Sainte-Colombe.
The French musical
perspective emulated reason
and moderation, with sensory
perception serving
comprehension. French
musicians aspired to thrill
the senses via the
intellect, in a continual
search for grace and
elegance. Dance was viewed
as the consummate expression
of the mastery of body and
mind and the epitome of
aristocratic art, as
evidenced by Louis XIV's
daily dance lessons for 20
years alongside frequent
guitar lessons. Every French
court and church musician
reflected musically their
determination to depict
refinement and true
sentiments, while dispensing
with excessive turbulence
and contrast. All of this
contrasted greatly with the
Italian focus on the direct
expression of emotions via
their virtuoso and
flamboyant approach, which
was indeed admired in some
circles in France.
 Wed.,
May 21 at 5 PM: — CONCERTI
from the COURT of FREDERICK
THE GREAT
· David Schrader,
harpsichord
· Jeffrey
Cohan, baroque
flute
· Elizabeth
Phelps, baroque
violin
· Courtney
Kuroda, baroque
violin
· Christine
Moran,
baroque viola
· Susie
Napper,
baroque cello
A concerto by Frederick II,
the monarch of Prussia from
1740, will be included
alongside the Suite in B Minor
by Johann Sebastian Bach,
whose visit to the king's
court in 1747 is legendary,
and concerti by Frederick's
keyboardist Carl Philipp
Emanuel Bach for both
harpsichord and flute.
|
~ updated
May 28, 2025 ~
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by sending your
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~ thank you!
SSEMF banner: detail
from "The Last Time it
Reached Zero" by James C.
Holl.
SSEMF presents
outstanding early
chamber music
on period instruments thanks
to your support. |
|
