In its sixth concert season under Artistic Director Garry Clarke, Baroque Band, Chicago’s period-instrument orchestra, will offer a lively array of programs inspired by classic movies, launch its own baroque choral ensemble, and continue its winning programming mix of perennial baroque favorites and unfamiliar gems, including performances of music by Purcell, Blow, Handel, Corelli, J.S. Bach, C.P.E. Bach, Telemann, Nagel, and Pachelbel.
As always, Baroque Band will be seen, live, in high definition, and up-close in its three intimate concert settings!
Subscriptions to all four concerts are $126; discounts are available for seniors ($114) and full-time students ($54). Single tickets for concerts at each venue are $35; discount ticket prices for seniors are $30 and for full-time students are $15. Tickets are available by calling Baroque Band at (312)-235-2368 or online at www.baroqueband.org.
Order Your Subscription OnlinePROGRAM 1: “All the King’s Men” – Music from the English Chapel Royal
featuring the Baroque Band Choral Ensemble
- October 19, 2012 – Music Institute of Chicago
- October 20, 2012 – Augustana Lutheran Church, Hyde Park
- October 24, 2012 – Grainger Ballroom, Symphony Center, Chicago
Baroque Band will take the 1949/2006 movie “All the King’s Men” as it’s starting point for an exploration of music from composers of the English Chapel Royal – Henry Purcell, John Blow, and George Frideric Handel. Although the Chapel Royal had existed for many years, John Blow (1649-1708) was the first composer to hold the official title, “Composer to the Chapel Royal,” when the post was created in 1699. Baroque Band’s opening program will feature Blow’s anthem God spake sometime in visions along with anthems and odes by Henry Purcell, and Handel’s magnificent Dixit Dominus.Baroque Band is excited to announce the debut of its own professional choral ensemble for this concert program.
PROGRAM 2: “Gone with the Wind” – with guest soloist Piers Adams, recorder
- January 16, 2013 – Grainger Ballroom, Symphony Center, Chicago
- January 18, 2013 – Music Institute of Chicago, Evanston
- January 19, 2013 – Augustana Lutheran Church, Hyde Park
At these concerts, British virtuoso recorder player Piers Adams will join Baroque Band for a whirlwind program of tempestuous recorder concertos by Vivaldi, Albinoni, and Telemann, including Vivaldi’s famous “La Tempesta” concerto. Known as the “modern-day Pied Piper,” Adams is regarded by many to be the greatest recorder player of our time. Stylistically unique and unbounded by historical preconceptions, he coaxes truly extraordinary sounds from his simple recorders. He has thrilled, charmed and transported listeners throughout the world, attracting the highest acclaim from audiences and the international music press. Adams’s performing career has taken him around the globe as soloist with orchestras including the BBC Symphony, the Philharmonia, The Academy of Ancient Music, Guildhall Strings, the English Sinfonia, and the Singapore Symphony Orchestra among many others. He is a member of the dazzling ensemble “Red Priest,” with whom he has won numerous awards for his recordings.
PROGRAM 3: “La Dolce Vita” – A Celebration of Arcangelo Corelli
- March 8, 2013 – Augustana Lutheran Church, Hyde Park
- March 9, 2013 – Music Institute of Chicago, Evanston
- March 13, 2013 – Grainger Ballroom, Symphony Center, Chicago
Fellini’s 1960 film “La Dolce Vita,” set against the backdrop of Roman high society, is the springboard for Baroque Band’s celebration of Arcangelo Corelli, to whom the Band will pay tribute during 2013, the 300th year since the composer’s death. Esteemed by Rome’s 17th- and 18th-century high society, and the foremost violinist of his time, Corelli had a powerful and lasting influence on the orchestra, on violin technique, and on the development of classical music. Musical society in Rome also owed much to Corelli; he was received in the highest circles of the aristocracy, and for a long time presided at the celebrated Monday concerts in the palace of Cardinal Ottoboni. Corelli’s influence can be traced from his time, through many famous violinists over the generations, to today.
PROGRAM 4: “The Godfather” – with soloist David Schrader, harpsichord
- June 7, 2013 – Augustana Lutheran Church, Hyde Park
- June 8, 2013 – Music Institute of Chicago, Evanston
- June 12, 2013 – Grainger Ballroom, Symphony Center, Chicago
The classic 1972 movie “The Godfather” provides the inspiration for a program featuring music by J.S.Bach (the godfather of Western Classical Music and whose music is featured in the movie), Telemann (godfather to Bach’s son, C.P.E. Bach), Pachelbel (godfather to one of Bach’s sisters), Sebastian Nagel (godfather to the great J.S. Bach), and C.P.E Bach, whose keyboard concerto will be performed by celebrated Chicago-based artist and Baroque Band harpsichordist David Schrader.
The orchestra’s four subscription concert programs will be performed in each of Baroque Band’s three Chicago-area venues: in the Grainger Ballroom at Symphony Center, 220 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago; at the Music Institute of Chicago (MIC), 1490 Chicago Ave. in Evanston; and in Hyde Park at Augustana Lutheran Church 5500 S. Woodlawn Ave., Chicago. All concerts will begin at 7:30 p.m.
ABOUT BAROQUE BAND
Baroque Band was founded by British baroque violinist Garry Clarke and debuted in Chicago in May 2007. Since then, the Band has given more than 100 performances throughout the region and has toured nationally. The orchestra was named Resident Ensemble of Chicago’s classical music station 98.7 WFMT in the summer of 2008, a position it retains today, and it released its first CD for the Grammy Award-winning Cedille Records label in February 2010 to international critical acclaim. Ensemble-in-Residence at the Music Institute of Chicago, Baroque Band has also been heard on Live from 98.7 WFMT, and on the Cultural Center’s Dame Myra Hess, and Salon concert series. The group has enjoyed multiple invitations to perform at major festivals such as the Ravinia Festival, Chicago’s Latino Music Festival and the Madison Early Music Festival. On tour, Baroque Band has been featured on distinguished concert series including the San Francisco Early Music Society, the American Bach Society, Grinnell College and Purdue University, among others. During the 2012-2013 season, Baroque Band will tour the mid-west and mid-Atlantic states.
Baroque Band is supported by grants from The Chicago Community Trust, the Richard Driehaus Foundation, The Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelley Foundation, The Negaunee Foundation, City of Chicago City Arts I, The Saints, and the Illinois Arts Council, a state agency.
ABOUT GARRY CLARKE
British violinist and conductor Garry Clarke founded Baroque Band in Chicago in 2007 after a career performing, recording, and touring with some of Europe’s most prestigious period-instrument orchestras, including The Academy of Ancient Music, The Sixteen, The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, The King’s Consort, The Hanover Band, and the Scholars, and working with musicians including Christopher Hogwood, John Elliot Gardener, Harry Christophers, Andrew Manze, Sir Charles Mackaras, Rene Jacobs, Anthony Halstead, and Robert King. Clarke was also a member of the European Baroque Orchestra under the direction of Ton Koopman, and has performed, recorded, and toured with William Christie and the French ensemble Les Arts Florissants.
Since moving to the United States in 2004 as an international recipient of the prestigious Arts Management Fellowship Award from the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., Clarke has concentrated on conducting, chamber music, and solo engagements. Clarke is a member of the faculty of Roosevelt University, where he conducts and directs the school’s baroque orchestra. In 2005 and 2006 he served as principal conductor of the Garth Newel Music Festival in Virginia. Other American ensembles with which Clarke has performed include the Washington Bach Consort, Opera Lafayette, The National Cathedral Baroque Orchestra, and The Orchestra of the 17th Century in Washington, D.C.; and New Trinty Baroque in Atlanta, Georgia.
Clarke graduated from the Royal College of Music in London.
Artist bios, photographs and interviews available upon request.
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