Recently lauded for her “invigorating verve and imagination” by the Washington Post, JULIE ANDRIJESKI, violin, viola, is among the leading Baroque violinists in the U.S.  She is a full-time member of the early-music trio, Chatham Baroque, an award-winning ensemble that performs throughout the Americas.  In addition, Ms. Andrijeski regularly appears with several other Baroque groups including, among others, Cleveland’s Apollo’s Fire, the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Cecilia’s Circle, Spiritus Collective, and the King’s Noyse.  Ms. Andrijeski’s unique performance style is greatly influenced by her knowledge and skilled performance of Baroque dance, and she often teaches both violin and dance at workshops.  Ms. Andrijeski is (finally) the proud owner of a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Early Music from Case Western Reserve University, awarded May 2006.  She has recorded extensively, and awaits the release of Chatham Baroque’s most recent recording project, sonatas from Prothimia suavissima, on Dorian Recordings.

Vocalist, harper, and scholar BENJAMIN BAGBY, voice, lyre, director of Sequentia, has been an important figure in medieval musical performance for over twenty-five years. He was the first graduate to earn a voice degree specializing in early music at the Oberlin Conservatory. He subsequently received an advanced degree in medieval music from the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis; it was in Basel that he and Barbara Thornton first formed Sequentia. The past thirty years have been almost uniquely devoted to the research, performance and recording work of Sequentia. Mr. Bagby also devotes his time to the solo performance of Anglo-Saxon oral poetry: an acclaimed bardic performance Beowulf receives at least twenty performances yearly worldwide and was recently released as a DVD by Koch Lorber Films; for more information see www.bagbybeowulf.com. Mr. Bagby has published articles about performance practice; as a guest lecturer and professor, he has taught courses and workshops all over Europe and North America and is currently teaching in the medieval music Master’s program at the Sorbonne in Paris.

Canadian COLIN BALZER, tenor, is fast becoming one of the most sought-after concert soloists of his generation. Recent and upcoming engagements include a U.S. tour with Bernard Labadie and Les Violons du Roy, Haydn’s Armide with the Hamburg Camerata, Händel’s Song of Solomon and Messiah and J. S. Bach’s St. John Passion with Tafelmusik, Bach’s Mass in B minor and Cantatas with the Québec Symphony and Early Music Vancouver, recitals throughout Germany, and a Mozart/Berlioz program for Music Director James Setapen’s farewell concerts with the Amarillo Symphony. In 2005, he created the role of Gavust in the world-premiere performances of Mattheson’s Boris Goudenow at the Boston Early Music Festival. With repertoire ranging from Monteverdi to Penderecki, Mr. Balzer has enjoyed critical acclaim on both sides of the Atlantic, working with such conductors as Helmuth Rilling, Simone Young, Simon Preston, Yoav Talmi, Gabriel Chmura, and Christof Perick, and performing with dozens of orchestras. Particularly esteemed as a recitalist, he has been welcomed at concert halls and festivals throughout Europe and North America.

JIM BANTA, commedia artist, was born and raised in upstate New York, where he first developed an interest in dance.  However, those earlier years were spent making independent films, as an actor and a stuntman. He has been dancing in the greater Boston area for the past ten years or so, and has had the privilege of working with many wonderful local groups and choreographers, including Ballet Arts Center of Winchester, Impulse Dance Company, Boston Liturgical Dance Ensemble, Snappy Dance Theater, Annikai Dance, Cambridge Chamber Ballet, Danny Swain, Audra Carabetta, Margot Parsons, Lorraine Chapman, and Rozann Kraus. He has also worked with visiting companies such as Meredith Monk, The Royal Ballet, Liz Lerman Dance Exchange, and White Oak Dance Project.  Currently he is performing with Peanut Butter and Jelly Dance Company, In Vivo Dance Productions, and Marjorie Morgan.  Jim has studied Commedia dell’Arte with Pamela Rosin.

Tenor MICHAEL BARRETT is active in the Boston area as a singer and choral conductor. After completing studies in voice and early music at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague, Michael returned to the U.S. in 2004 to take up conducting positions at Harvard University. While in Europe he was a member of the Huelgas Ensemble, directed by Paul van Nevel, and the Netherlands Bach Society, directed by Jos van Veldhoven. In the U.S., Michael directs the vocal ensemble Sprezzatura; and has performed with Blue Heron Renaissance Choir, directed by Scott Metcalfe; Seven Times Salt; Cut Circle, directed by Jesse Rodin; Boston Secession, directed by Jane Ring Frank; and Ensemble Trinitas, directed by Tom Zajac.  In 2005, he appeared in the Boston Early Music Festival’s production of Mattheson’s Boris Goudenow. Michael received an AB in music from Harvard and an MM in choral conducting from Indiana University.

ERIC BELLOCQ, lute, organ, studied the guitar with Alexandre Lagoya at the Paris Conservatory; he graduated with a First Prize. He played the theorbo with Les Arts Florissants from 1983 to 1990; during this period he regularly took part in opera productions and concert performances with La Chapelle Royale, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Les Talens Lyriques, La Grande Ecurie et la Chambre du Roy, Le Concert Spirituel, Akâdemia, Le concert d’Astrée, and La Fenice. Since 1990, he has concentrated on solo performances and his role as lutenist in Ensemble Clément Janequin. In addition to his solo recitals on the lute, theorbo, and Renaissance guitar, Eric Bellocq accompanies Dominique Visse with jazz pianist François Couturier in recitals of music ranging from Machaut to Berio; with juggler Vincent de Lavenère, he has created the staged show Le chant des balles: an encounter of early music, improvisation, and juggling. Eric Bellocq has made numerous recordings for over a dozen labels, and teaches at the Paris Conservatory.
KRISTIAN BEZUIDENHOUT, fortepiano, harpsichord, born in 1979, graduated summa cum laude from the Eastman School of Music. At 21, he won the prestigious First Prize as well as the Audience Prize in the 2001 Bruges Fortepiano Competition, a double honor, this being only the third time the prize has been awarded in the history of the competition. Bezuidenhout has collaborated with Frans Brüggen, Giuliano Carmignola, Pieter Wispelwey, Paul O’Dette, Mark Padmore, Daniel Hope, Malcolm Bilson, and Collegium Vocale Gent; performed concertos with Concerto Köln, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe (their recording of Bach concertos was named Editor’s Choice in Gramophone Magazine), the Australian Brandenburg Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century, and the Handel and Haydn Society; and appeared in the early music festivals of Boston, Bruges, St. Petersburg, Venice, and Utrecht. Kristian will be performing with Carolyn Sampson at Haydn Festival Esterhaza, with the Freiburger Barockorchester and Petra Müllejans, the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and presenting two complete cycles of the Beethoven Piano Concertos: one with the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century, and the other with the Kammerakademie Potsdam under Andrea Marcon. His web site is at www.kristianbezuidenhout.com.

Born in 1983 in Würzburg, ANDREAS BÖHLEN, Renaissance recorder, moved to Northern Germany in 1988. He took up the recorder at the age of six, and some years later began playing the alto saxophone. From the beginning, he played in ensembles, bands, and musical productions all over North Germany. He received lessons at the Conservatories of Bremen and Cologne while still in high school. After living in Cologne for a year he moved to Amsterdam in 2003. In Amsterdam, he founded his own chamber music groups for early and contemporary music, and also for jazz. He received many awards at German “Jugend musiziert” and “Jugend Jazzt” competitions, and at other major competitions as well. He performs with The Royal Wind Music, and has been collaborating with radio stations in Germany and Holland. For more details, see his web site at www.andreasboehlen.de.

GILBERT BLIN, Stage Director, graduated from the Sorbonne with a concentration in Rameau’s operas and their relation to the stage, an interest that has since broadened to encompass French opera and its relationship to Baroque theatre, his fields of expertise as a historian and stage director. He was an adviser for Arnold Östman’s productions of Gluck’s operas: Iphigénie en Tauride (Drottningholm, 1990) and Alceste (Concertgebouw, Amsterdam, 1993).  Blin was stage director for Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice at the Drottningholm Theatre in 1992. This production, filmed by Swedish Television, was revived in 1998. In 1991, Gilbert Blin directed Massenet’s Werther for Opéra de Nancy. He presented a new version of the show in 1994 for the Opéra-Comique in Paris. In 1995, Gilbert Blin directed Delibes’s Lakmé for the same house, an acclaimed production frequently revived in France through 2000. In 1999, Gilbert Blin was the first French stage director invited by the Prague State Opera: his production of Meyerbeer’s Robert le Diable is in the repertory of the house. Since its foundation in 1999, Gilbert Blin has been the director of Académie Desprez, Association Française pour le Rayonnement du Théâtre du Château de Drottningholm. This historical building allows Gilbert Blin, in partnership with musicologist Rémy-Michel Trotier, to lead research on and develop a whole practice for period theatre through publications and stage productions on an international scale. The Académie Desprez’s original achievement was supported by the Drottningholmsteaterns Vänner foundation when Gilbert Blin received, in 2002, the Henrik Nordmark stipendium from HRH the Princess Victoria of Sweden. For the Boston Early Music Festival, with Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, Gilbert Blin directed the fully staged production of Lully’s Thésée in 2001. He designed and directed Vivaldi’s Orlando Furioso for the Prague State Opera, and a 2003 staged reconstruction of Vivaldi’s Rosmira Fedele for the Opéra de Nice. Recent projects include a reconstruction of the original sets of Mozart’s Don Giovanni for Prague in 2006, and a new production ofHändel’s Teseo for Opéra de Nice in 2007.

MARILYN BOENAU, Baroque bassoon, holds a Soloist’s Diploma from the Schola Cantorum in Basel, Switzerland, where she studied recorder and shawm with Michel Piguet, and dulcian and bassoon with Walter Stiftner. She has performed and recorded with most of the leading Baroque orchestras in North America, including Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, the Handel and Haydn Society, Tafelmusik, Portland Baroque Orchestra, Apollo’s Fire, Tempesta di Mare, and Opera Lafayette. In Europe she has worked with The Harp Consort, Collegium Vocale, and Freiburg Baroque.  She has performed Renaissance music with the Boston Shawm and Sackbut Ensemble, Blue Heron Renaissance Choir, and the Folger Consort.  Her playing has been called “breathtaking” by the Portland Oregonian.  In addition to her performing career, Marilyn is the Executive Director of Amherst Early Music, Inc., which presents the Amherst Early Music Festival at Connecticut College in New London, Connecticut.

ALEXANDER BONUS, Baroque trumpet, maintains a varied career performing historic brass and keyboard continuo instruments, in addition to his activities as a conductor, researcher, record producer, and composer. He appears with ensembles such as Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Magnificat, Apollo’s Fire, Indianapolis Baroque Orchestra, the Newberry Consort, and Chicago Opera Theater. As a recitalist, Alexander has performed with Tragicomedia and Niklas Eklund.  He has lectured at Northwestern University, Roosevelt University, the Newberry Library, and the Eastman School of Music. Mr. Bonus is founding director of The Forces of Virtue Ensemble. Their first album is currently heard across the country in the American Library Association’s traveling exhibit, Elizabeth I: Ruler and Legend. Alexander Bonus holds MM and BM degrees from the Eastman School of Music, and is pursuing a PhD in musicology at Case Western Reserve University, where he has directed the school’s collegium and teaches music history.

Countertenor RICARD BORDAS graduated from the Royal Academy of Music in London, and has performed in opera and on the concert stage in Europe and America. He has worked with conductors Riccardo Muti, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, René Jacobs, Christophe Rousset, Harry Christophers, Joshua Rifkin, and Philippe Herreweghe, among others, and has performed at La Scala, Netherlands Opera, Opera de Lausanne, Royal Albert Hall, Barbican Hall, Wigmore Hall, and Auditorio Nacional in Madrid. Mr. Bordas has performed in numerous festivals such as the Proms, Innsbruck, Dresden, Herne, Halle, Schwetzingen, Beaune, Amsterdam, Utrecht, Barcelona, and Granada. He has recorded for the labels DHS, Verany, and Discantus. Ricard Bordas has conducted choirs since he was seventeen, including early music groups such as the Camerata Hispánica, and more recently opera. He is the artistic director of Barcino Baroque. Ricard Bordas is married to soprano Margaret Kelly Cook, and has a two-year-old son named Mateu. 

ERIK BOSGRAAF, Renaissance recorder, has studied the recorder with Pia Elsdörfer, Walter van Hauwe, and Paul Leenhouts. He is also a musicologist with an MA degree from the University of Utrecht, specializing in Dutch songbooks from around 1750. In cooperation with musicologist Thiemo Wind, he has released a three-cd boxed set with the works of Jacob van Eyck on the Brilliant Classics label. He will make his solo début at this year’s Utrecht Early Music Festival. He performs extensively with The Royal Wind Music. Since 2002, Erik has been working intensively with guitarist Izhar Elias, creating a new repertoire of over thirty pieces as well as producing movies with some of the most vibrant experimental film makers of today. A tangible result of these activities is the cd/dvd big eye on Phenom Records. This year’s performances include tours in Europe, Southeast Asia, and Australia, and masterclasses at Mahidol University Bangkok, Sydney Conservatorium, and Melbourne University. More information is available at www.erikbosgraaf.com.

THE BOSTON EARLY MUSIC FESTIVAL ORCHESTRA & CHORUS is comprised of the best Baroque instrumentalists and exciting young singers from around the world. The orchestra and chorus was initially brought together for the biennial Boston Early Music Festival (BEMF) opera centerpiece and for orchestral concerts at the festival, initially under a variety of names, but now recognized as an integral part of BEMF with its recent renaming. BEMF has initiated a project to record some of its groundbreaking work in the field of Baroque opera using the orchestra and chorus; the first in this series, the 2003 Festival centerpiece Ariadne by Johann Georg Conradi, was met with enormous audience and critical praise, including a nomination for a 2005 Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording.  Last year, the BEMF Orchestra & Chorus made the second recording in BEMF’s Baroque opera series, which is being released in spring 2007: Jean-Baptiste Lully’s Thésée, the 2001 Festival centerpiece. For the third recording, they will be recapturing the glory of the current Festival’s centerpiece opera, the 1678 version of Lully’s Psyché, which will be released in the spring of 2008. The BEMF Orchestra has performed concertos with internationally renowned soloists such as Giuliano Carmignola and Matthias Maute, and with the Chorus has presented modern premieres of Baroque serenatas and cantatas. The BEMF Orchestra & Chorus has just made its first appearance on the BEMF annual concert series, presenting the North American premiere of Pergolesi’s Marian Vespers.

VINCENT BOUCHOT, baritone, was born in Toulouse, France, in 1966. Having studied at La Chapelle Royale with Philippe Herreweghe and at the Studio Versailles Opéra with Rachel Yakar and René Jacobs, Vincent Bouchot has been a member of Ensemble Clément Janequin since 1994. He now shares his professional activity between singing and composing. A respected specialist in Renaissance polyphony, he is equally passionate about the creation of new work and many composers have written for him, including Gérard Pesson, Henri Pousseur, Bruno Gillet, Carlo Carcano, Christophe Looten, and Denis Chouillet. As a composer himself, he has written music for many children’s tales and several operas, which have been presented at the Opéra Comique, Péniche Opéra de Paris, Opéra de Rennes, and Opéra de Nantes. For many years he has been a member of the Dedalus Ensemble, with which he has performed the experimental works of American composers such as John Cage, Alvin Lucier, Frederic Rzewski, Tom Johnson, and Philip Glass.

STEPHANIE BRANDT, Renaissance recorder, was born and raised in Eschweiler, Germany. She received her bachelor degree from the Conservatory of Amsterdam in 2004, studying with Paul Leenhouts; she then continued in its Advanced Studies Program, specializing in chamber music and educational studies, completing her Master of Music degree in June 2006. Since 1999, she has been a member of The Royal Wind Music, directed by Paul Leenhouts; with them, she has toured Europe many times, and recorded two cds. Together with María Martínez Ayerza, recorders, and Harma Everts, voice, she founded the contemporary music trio AeroDynamic. In 2005 they were awarded the second prize at the Ninth International Competition of Contemporary Chamber Music in Krakow, and were finalists at the Dutch National Chamber Music Competition in Almere. As a soloist, she was awarded the third prize in the 2005 Moeck/SRP Solo Recorder Competition in London. Stephanie also performs regularly in concerts for children, and is a music educator.

TINA CASSIDY, professional dancer, teacher, and choreographer, received her B.A. in Dance from Mercyhurst College in Erie, Pennsylvania, and her M.F.A. from the Boston Conservatory. She has performed with a number of dance companies including Lake Erie Ballet, Indianapolis Ballet Theater, Indianapolis Dance Company, Boston Dance Company, Burklyn Ballet Theatre, Melrose Youth Ballet, and, for ten seasons, Northern Ballet Theatre in Nashua, New Hampshire, under the direction of Doreen Cafarella; she also serves as Ballet Mistress for the company. Currently a teacher at the Northern Ballet Theatre School, Tina has taught for fourteen years in schools throughout Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, and Indiana. She has also choreographed extensively for the Peacock Players, a New Hampshire-based youth theatre, where she was honored with “Best Choreographer of a Community Musical” at the 2004 New Hampshire Theatre awards. Tina has previously danced in five operatic centerpieces with the Boston Early Music Festival, including Ercole Amante, which toured to Utrecht, Holland.

AGNETHE CHRISTENSEN, mezzo-soprano, is originally from Sweden, and studied at the Royal Danish Conservatory. She later specialized in Renaissance and medieval singing with Andrea von Ramm in Basel, with subsequent studies in Rome and Paris. Well known for her unconventional interpretations of modern and classical works, she presents a thrilling exponent for the recent wave of, and exploratory marriage between, contemporary, folk, and early vocal music. Agnethe has worked with modern composers Luca Lombardi, Palle Mikkelborg, Wolfgang Rihm, Luciano Berio and John Cage; with opera, folk, and film music; with Baroque orchestras and directors such as Reinhard Goebel, Frieder Bernius, and Concerto Copenhagen; and with her own medieval group, Alba, with which she has released several recordings. She works with ensemble Ulv performing historic folk music from Scandinavia, and also appears on opera stages world-wide, performing primarily modern and Baroque opera, most recently with the Danish performance group Hotel Proforma in the picture opera Operation Orfeo. She has performed with Sequentia since 2001.

DAVID COFFIN, Director of Education, has been performing throughout New England since 1980 as a singer and instrumentalist. With a wide repertoire, he blends his love of early music with folk music, often combining styles and instruments. Since 2000, Mr. Coffin has developed several School Enrichment Programs, one of which is being presented during this year’s Boston Early Music Festival. Music for the King’s Court: Exploring the Early Winds is an exciting and inspiring program showing off the virtues of the recorder, the science of sound, and demonstrating how much fun music can be. Being a “Nantucket Coffin” also earns him the honor of presenting an imaginary 19th-century whaling voyage in schools: with his concertina and harpoon, he takes students around the Horn to the Pacific whaling grounds for an unforgettable, historically rich experience. Mr. Coffin has recently joined BEMF as Director of Education in hopes of expanding the organization’s presence into New England schools. For more information, please visit his web site at www.davidcoffin.com.

CAROLINE COPELAND, dancer, joined the New York Baroque Dance Company under the direction of Catherine Turocy, where her featured roles include the title role in Handel’s Terpsicore, Euridice in Gluck’s Orphée, and the Galant in Mozart’s Les Petits Riens.  Ms. Copeland was assistant director to Ms. Turocy in her productions of Rousseau’s Le Devin du Village with Antoine Plante and the Mercury Baroque Ensemble, and Handel’s Atalanta with Nicholas McGegan and the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra in Göttingen, Germany.  Ms. Copeland has performed with the Boston Early Music Festival in their productions of Lully’s Thésée and Conradi’s Ariadne as well as the New York Collegium in their program Music for the Sun King.   She has appeared with numerous companies and contemporary choreographers, including Company Rindfleisch, The Metropolitan Opera, and The Maffei Dance Company.  Ms. Copeland’s dancing has been described as “sublime,” “alluring,” and “enrapturous,” earning her mentions in the Wall Street Journal, Backstage Magazine, and Show Business Weekly.

VINCENT COURRIER, bagpipes, flute, learned to play the recorder at the Conservatoire National de Région in Versailles with Pierre Boragno, before joining Pierre Hamon’s class at the Lyons Conservatoire in 2002; he obtained his diploma in 2006. He then attended classes with Pedro Memelsdorff at the Escola Superior de Musica de Catalunya. Interested in traditional music, he also learned to play the bagpipe and the pipe and tabor. Vincent Courrier plays with many ensembles, including Le Poème Harmonique, La Dolce Sere, and Les Boréades.

HÉLOÏSE DEGRUGILLIER, recorder, has worked extensively as both a recorder performer and teacher throughout Europe and the United States.  Recent performances included a solo recital at the National Music Museum in South Dakota, and as a concerto soloist with Harmonious Blacksmith in Baltimore. She is a founding member of the Tarantella Recorder Trio, finalists in the 2006 Early Music America Medieval/Renaissance competition.  Héloïse enjoys an active teaching career, working with the Boston Recorder Society, Early Music of Metro West, and in her private studio.  She is currently studying Alexander technique in Newton, Massachusetts, and has an MM from the Utrecht Conservatory in the Netherlands.  She has studied with Heiko ter Scheggett, Saskia Coolen, and Pedro Memelsdorff.

RENAUD DELAIGUE, bass, initially distinguished himself in the great Mozart bass roles, especially at Festival de Saint-Céré, before being noticed by some of the great names in early music. Dominique Visse recruited him immediately as one of the pillars of his famous Ensemble Clément Janequin, and Jean-Claude Malgoire entrusted him with role after role in operas from Monteverdi to Rossini, as well as Messiah, Mozart’s Requiem and Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. William Christie, Rinaldo Alessandrini, Hervé Niquet, and Christophe Rousset clearly consider him as one of the golden voices of the Baroque stage, casting him in operas such as Charpentier’s David et Jonathas and Lully’s Psyché. Renaud Delaigue has also sung in productions as diverse as Berlioz’s Benvenuto Cellini under John Nelson, Pelléas et Mélisande revived by Alexandre Tharaud at the Musée d’Orsay, Honnegger’s Jeanne au bûcher with Jean-Marc Cochereau, St. Matthew Passion with Kurt Masur, and Saint-Saens’s Le Déluge and Debussy’s The Fall of the House of Usher with the Orchestre National de France.

PAMELA DELLAL, mezzo-soprano, is a sought-after oratorio soloist who has performed under William Christie, Christopher Hogwood, and Seiji Ozawa as soloist with such renowned ensembles as the Handel and Haydn Society, Boston Baroque, The Bach Choir of Bethlehem, Aston Magna, the Dallas Bach Society, and the Tokyo Oratorio Society. She has been featured by The Opera Company of Boston, The Red House Opera Group, Opera Aperta, and Prism Opera in leading roles in the operas Alcina, Albert Herring, Dido and Aeneas, La Clemenza di Tito, Così Fan Tutte, Vanessa, The Rape of Lucretia, and others. With Sequentia, Ms. Dellal has recorded the music of Hildegard von Bingen, and toured the U.S., Europe, and Australia. She appears frequently with Musicians of the Old Post Road, Ensemble Chaconne, and is a regular soloist with Emmanuel Music. Her broad repertoire includes early chamber music, opera, concert works, and contemporary pieces. She has recordings on Arabesque Records, Artona, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, CRI, Dorian, Meridian, and KOCH International Classics.

MARK DOBELL, tenor, was a choral scholar of Clare College, Cambridge, where he read Classics. He later studied at the Royal Academy of Music, with Edward Brooks and Iain Ledingham, and received the Clifton Prize for the best final recital. Mark has an extensive repertoire; recent highlights include performances of Bach’s Magnificat with Sir Roger Norrington, Haydn’s Nelson Mass under Sir John Eliot Gardiner, Bach’s St. Matthew Passion and Mozart’s Requiem for Harry Christophers, Biber’s Requiem for Paul McCreesh, and Karl Jenkins’s The Armed Man. Forthcoming projects include performances of Bach’s St. John Passion in Seville, Granada, Porto, and Antwerp. On stage, Mark has performed principal roles in operas by Britten, Mozart, Janacek, and Handel. Mark has performed with many leading choirs and consort groups, such as The Sixteen, the Monteverdi Choir, and The Tallis Scholars. In September 2006, he took up a position in the choir of Westminster Abbey.

DAVID DOUGLASS, violin, viola, director of The King’s Noyse, began his career in 1975 with The Musicians of Swanne Alley, and since then, especially through his work with The King’s Noyse, has established himself as the foremost exponent of the Renaissance violin. Most recently, in 2007 Mr. Douglass was named Artist-in-Residence at the Newberry Library in Chicago, as a curator of music manuscripts and director of the Newberry Consort. He has recorded extensively on many labels, and in 2005 he formed Noyse Productions, online at www.noyseproductions.com, where he markets editions of music and cds of The King’s Noyse and others.  David Douglass is an esteemed teacher, writer, and speaker on the early violin, and can be found teaching at many summer workshops.  In all of his roles as teacher, performer, and director, he stresses the need to transcend the facts of historical performance in order to approach early music as an art that speaks for us today. 

LENORE DOXSEE, Lighting Designer, is a lighting designer for theater, opera, and dance.  This is her second design for the Boston Early Music Festival; she was the lighting designer for Boris Goudenow.  Other recent designs include Cunning Little Vixen at Houston Grand Opera and Lyric Opera of Chicago; La Donna del Lago, Flavio, and Orlando at New York City Opera; Faustus, the Last Night and Tamerlano for Spoleto USA; and Faust Parts 1 & 2 for Target Margin Theater.  Ms. Doxsee is the resident lighting designer for Target Margin.  Regionally and abroad she has designed for Glimmerglass Opera, Opera de Montreal, La Jolla Playhouse, Singapore Repertory Theatre, and many others.  Ms. Doxsee received a 2006 Bessie Award for her lighting of Miguel Gutierrez’s “Retrospective Exhibitionist/Difficult Bodies” at Dance Theater Workshop, and an Obie Award for Target Margin’s Mamba’s Daughters in 1998.  Ms. Doxsee teaches design at New York University.

After studying art history at the École du Louvre and classical guitar at the École Normale de Musique in Paris, VINCENT DUMESTRE, citole, theorbo, director of Le Poème Harmonique, devoted himself to the lute, Baroque guitar, and theorbo, studying with Hopkinson Smith, Eugène Ferré, and Rolf Lislevand. In 1997, Vincent Dumestre formed Le Poème Harmonique, a chamber ensemble and orchestra specializing in the Baroque repertoire, of which he is the artistic director. From the very first, the ensemble’s productions won both critical acclaim and popularity. In 1999 the French music magazine Diapason voted Vincent Dumestre “Young Talent of the Year.” In March 2002, Vincent Dumestre received the Antonio Vivaldi International Record Award from the Cini Foundation in Venice for Emilio de’ Cavalieri’s Lamentations on the Alpha label. In 2004, Vincent Dumestre was made a Chevalier des Arts et des Lettres by the French Ministry of Culture.

Born in Leeds, England in 1986, RUTH DYSON, Renaissance recorder, learned recorder with her father and was later taught by Alan Davis at Chetham’s music school in Manchester. She has also studied with Daniel Bruggen at the Royal Academy of Music in London, and won second prize in the 2003 Moeck/SRP International Solo Recorder Competition. Now at the Sweelinck Conservatorium in Amsterdam, she studies with Walter van Hauwe, Paul Leenhouts, and Jorge Isaac, and practices and performs a wide variety of different music including the work of living composers, and Baroque, Medieval, Renaissance, and jazz repertoires. Ruth is also exploring improvisation, and experimenting with an electronic wind instrument (EWI). In addition to playing in The Royal Wind Music, Ruth is a member of a trio and a quintet, performing contemporary and Renaissance music.

MAXINE EILANDER, Baroque harp, has appeared as a Baroque harpist with many leading ensembles and festivals throughout Europe, Canada, and the U.S., including Tragicomedia, Teatro Lirico, Boston Early Music Festival, Tafelmusik, Les Talens Lyriques, The Toronto Consort, Les Voix Humaines, The Sixteen, and Seattle Baroque. She has made many recordings, including Handel’s Harp concerto with Tafelmusik; Sonata al Pizzico, a recording of Italian music for harp and Baroque guitar with duo partner Stephen Stubbs; and a recent recording with Teatro Lirico for ECM, which was a New York Times “pick of the year” in 2006. Maxine plays on a range of specialized early harps: the Italian arpa doppia, the Spanish cross-strung harp, the German “Davidsharfe,” the Welsh triple harp for which Handel wrote his harp concerto, and the classical single action pedal harp. Maxine teaches harp at the Accademia d’Amore in Seattle and is Managing Director of the Seattle Academy of Baroque Opera.

The performances of JAY ELFENBEIN, double bass, have been described by the New York Times as “played magnificently” and “with virtuosity and flair.” He is principal bassist and violone player with New York Collegium, Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Opera Lafayette, and the Washington Bach Consort, among others; has appeared as a viola da gamba soloist in both Bach Passions throughout the Northeast; and performed on bass violin with Tragicomedia, the Portland Baroque Orchestra, and Early Music New York. He has recorded for Sony Classics, CBS, PGM, and Newport Classics, among others, and played vihuela and vielle on Paul Simon’s You’re the One. Mr. Elfenbein is the founder and director of the Ivory Consort, a medieval ensemble, and GambaDream, the creative new jazz/contemporary ensemble that features Mr. Elfenbein on electric viola da gamba. He is a published composer whose work has been commissioned and performed on four continents; his orchestral and large jazz works have been premiered in New York City.

DANIEL ELYAR, violin, viola, is an active performer and recording artist and has specialized in Baroque performance practice for the past fifteen years. He has performed and recorded with ensembles in North America and Europe such as Tafelmusik, the Utrecht Baroque Consort, Concerto d’Amsterdam, Teatro Lirico, Concerto Palatino, the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, the New York Collegium, Ensemble REBEL, Philomel, Tempesta di Mare, and Clarion Players and Choir in New York City.  Mr. Elyar holds a Bachelor of Music degree from the Cleveland Institute of Music, an Artist’s Diploma from the Sweelinck Conservatory of Amsterdam, and a Master of Music degree from the Royal Conservatory in The Hague. His teachers include Heidi Castleman, Sigiswald Kuijken, Lucy van Dael, and Monica Huggett.  Mr. Elyar has performed under the baton of such directors as Gustav Leonhardt, Ton Koopman, and William Christie, and has recorded for the Chandos, ATMA, and Hungarton labels.

Acclaimed for his “exemplary diction and rich baritone voice,” AARON ENGEBRETH, baritone, maintains an active solo career in opera, oratorio, and recital, and has devoted considerable energy and time to the performance of new music, often collaborating with composers. Mr. Engebreth has received significant recognition for his interpretation of early music and is a frequent soloist with many of the country’s finest early-music organizations, including the American Bach Soloists, Handel and Haydn Society, Boston Early Music Festival, Miami Bach Society, Boston Baroque, San Francisco Bach Choir, Boston Camerata, Santa Fe Pro Musica, Musicians of the Old Post Road, Newport Baroque, and Boston Cecilia. Mr. Engebreth also sings regularly on the famed Bach cantata series with Emmanuel Music under conductor Craig Smith. While on the music faculty of Tufts University, he was twice awarded faculty development grants to study music of the French Baroque in Paris. Mr. Engebreth has served on the music faculty of the Boston Conservatory, and is an artistic director of the Florestan Recital Project.

Canadian NORMAN ENGEL, trumpet, enjoys a richly diversified career, performing on both modern and historical instruments as one of a new generation of players who feels at home in all genres of music. Mr. Engel performs extensively as soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral player. His career as one of North America’s leading performers on natural trumpet has taken him throughout the continent, across Europe, and to Asia and New Zealand. Since 1993, Mr. Engel has been a member of Canada’s renowned Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra.  He also performs with American Bach Soloists, Opera Atelier, Apollo’s Fire, New York Collegium, Santa Fe Pro Musica, Indianapolis Baroque, Portland Baroque, Les Boréades de Montreal, Aradia Ensemble, and the Toronto Consort. Norman Engel has performed on more than 45 recordings for Sony Classical, Deutsche Harmonia Mundi, Naxos, CBC, Analekta, ATMA, and Opening Day records. He has given masterclasses for the Toronto Trumpet Symposium, Tafelmusik Summer Institute, Grand Valley State University, and the University of Toronto.

Created in Paris in 1978, ENSEMBLE CLÉMENT JANEQUIN performs sacred and secular vocal music of the Renaissance from Josquin to Monteverdi. Their inimitable performances of the 16th-century French chanson have revealed one of the Golden Ages in the history of French music; their recordings for harmonia mundi—Les cris de Paris, Le chant des oyseaulx, Fricassée parisienne, and La chasse—are benchmark interpretations. These appealing works by Janequin, Sermisy, Lassus, Le Jeune, and numerous others, abound in the stylistic contrasts so dear to the Renaissance: the touching lyricism of the chanson amoureuse, the earthy humour of the chanson rustique that draws upon popular farce, the sounds of war, nature, and street cries—a unique marriage of popular and high Renaissance culture. Ensemble Clément Janequin has performed extensively throughout the world, often with the support of the French Foreign Ministry (AFAA—Association française d’Action artistique). The Ensemble’s recordings of sacred and secular music have won many awards: Canciones y Ensaladas won the Gramophone Award, and Autant en emporte le vent, chansons by Claude Le Jeune, was recently awarded a Diapason d’Or.

Beginning as an instrumentalist, FRANÇOIS FAUCHÉ, baritone, was seduced by the vocal arts at the age of sixteen when his passion for early music found its initial expression in the recorder and voice classes at the Conservatoire National Supérieur Musique in Toulouse. His long and rich journey as a soloist and a polyphonic vocal specialist has included appearances with Les Arts Florissants and Ensemble Organum, in liturgical drama and Baroque opera, at the Péniche Opéra and the Théâtre du Châtelet, touring the U.S. and Japan, on over forty recordings, and, since 1991, as a member of Dominique Visse’s Ensemble Clément Janequin. He has also performed in many staged productions including those directed by Pierre Barrat, Mireille Laroche, Jean-Louis Martinoty, and Jean-Marie Villégié, and worked with conductors such as William Christie, René Jacobs, Sigiswald Kuijken, Graham O’Reilly, Françoise Lasserre, Jean-Claude Malgoire, Hervé Niquet, Marcel Pérès, Denis Raisin-Dadre, Jean Tubéry, and Jordi Savall.

KATHLEEN FAY, BEMF Executive Director, Psyché Executive Producer,has served as Executive Director of the Boston Early Music Festival since 1991, and has been with the organization for over 20 years.   She is responsible for all administrative, development, and artistic functions of the organization, and manages all details related to biennial Festivals and the annual Concert Series.  Kathy is a founding Trustee of the Catalogue for Philanthropy, and serves on the boards of the Cambridge Society for Early Music and of Exsultemus, a Boston-based vocal ensemble specializing in music of the Renaissance.  She also serves on the advisory board of Harvard University’s Early Music Series. In November 2001, Kathy was named Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Minister of Culture as a result of her significant contribution to furthering the arts in France and throughout the world.  In June 2003, she received the distinguished Arion Award from the Cambridge Society of Early Music for her “outstanding contributions to musical culture.”  Kathy is a widely respected impresario and promoter of early music in the Boston area and throughout the United States.  She holds graduate degrees in Piano Performance and Music Teaching from the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music.

AMANDA FORSYTHE, soprano, has been praised by Opera News for her “pure tone” and “wonderful agility and silvery top notes.” She recently débuted with Opera Boston as The Angel in the North American premiere of Peter Eötvös’s opera Angels in America, a performance hailed as “powerfully sung” (The New York Times). Ms. Forsythe created the role of Young Margarita in Osvaldo Golijov’s Ainadamar, and was acclaimed for her “raw passion” (Los Angeles Times), “sparkling clarity” (Financial Times), and “crystalline, finely expressive voice” (The New Yorker). Ms. Forsythe has appeared as a soloist with Boston Baroque, the Handel and Haydn Society, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Omaha, Hartford, and Charlotte Symphonies, Apollo’s Fire, and at the Tanglewood, Caramoor, and Ravinia Festivals. She has premiered works by John Austin, Carson Cooman, Tod Machover, and Elena Ruehr, and received awards from the George London, Liederkranz, and Walter W. Naumburg Foundations. She recently recorded Lully’s Thésée with the Boston Early Music Festival.

’Cellist SARAH FREIBERG, basse de violon, was a principal ’cello of San Francisco’s Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra and the Portland Baroque Orchestra, and now performs in the same capacity with Boston Baroque and the Handel and Haydn Society. She has also performed with the New York Collegium, Seattle Baroque, Ensemble Arion, and the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra. A corresponding editor for Strings magazine, she has contributed dozens of articles to that publication, including many on performance practice issues. She received D.M.A. and M.M. degrees from S.U.N.Y. Stony Brook, an Artist Certificate from the San Francisco Conservatory, and degrees from Brown University and the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria. She edited the sonatas of Francesco Guerini for the Broude Trust, and recorded them and Laurenti sonatas for Centaur Records. Ms. Freiberg can be heard on numerous recordings, including as soloist in Mozart’s Concertone. She teaches in the historical performance department of Boston University.

DOUGLAS FREUNDLICH, lute, launched his lute career in the 1970s with The Greenwood Consort, winning the Erwin Bodky Award and Musical America’s “Young Artist of the Year.” He has performed with many leading ensembles, including the Boston Early Music Festival, the Boston Symphony, Boston Baroque, Emmanuel Music, The Musicians of Swanne Alley, Ex Machina, Renaissonics, Hesperus, and Revels. Doug is a founding member of the Venere Lute Quartet, which has received rave reviews from Amadeus, Early Music America, Goldberg, and Renaissance Magazines. The quartet tours Italy this season; Doug also has tours and recording projects with Renaissonics, Fanfare Consort, and Capella Alamire. Doug teaches lute at the Longy School of Music, where he is acting chair of the Early Music Department. He also teaches for Harvard’s Core Program, where he has received two Derek Bok Awards for Excellence in Teaching. He has recorded for the Telarc, Titanic, Sine Qua Non, Revels, Radian Arts, and LSA labels.

Canada’s superstar soprano KARINA GAUVIN has impressed audiences and critics the world over with her luscious timbre, profound musicality, and wide vocal range. The Globe and Mail calls her “our great soprano—distinctive, sophisticated, deeply intuitive, a questioning and fearless artist” whose performances have regularly “brought down the house” (Boston Globe). Her repertoire ranges from Johann Sebastian Bach to Luciano Berio, and she has sung with many major orchestras including the Chicago Symphony, Philadelphia Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Minnesota Orchestra, Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, Les Violons du Roy, and Accademia Bizantina. On the operatic and concert stage, she has performed with conductors as diverse as Charles Dutoit, Kent Nagano, Semyon Bichkov, Roger Norrington, Christopher Hogwood, Helmuth Rilling, Bernard Labadie, and Andrew Parrott. Also active as a recitalist, she has collaborated with several chamber music ensembles, and with pianists Marc-André Hamelin, Michael McMahon, and Roger Vignoles. A prolific recording artist with nineteen releases to her credit, she sang the title role in Johann Georg Conradi’s opera Ariadne for the 2003 Boston Early Music Festival, which was later released on the CPO label and nominated for a Grammy Award in 2006.

ELIZABETH GAVER, fiddle, has earned degrees in music from Stanford University and The Juilliard School and has also studied medieval performance practice with Thomas Binkley at the Early Music Institute of Indiana University. Since 1992, she has performed and recorded extensively with Sequentia, and was a core member of the ensemble from 1992 to 1997. She has lived in Oslo, Norway, since 1997, where she is a member of the medieval ensemble, Modus, and has also played violin in several Baroque orchestras and small ensembles. Ms. Gaver plays hardingfele with the Norwegian folk music group, Feleboga, performing and teaching dance workshops in the U.S., Germany, Poland, and Thailand. Together with Lena Susanne Norin and Agnethe Christensen, she is a member of the new trio Ulv, performing Swedish medieval ballads and folk hymns. When performing Edda, she plays a four-string fiddle reconstructed by Richard Earle in 2001 from a drawing found in an English Psalter dating from circa 1050.

ARWIEKE GLAS, Renaissance recorder, studied recorder with Paul Leenhouts at the Conservatory of Amsterdam, and with Antonio Politano in Lausanne, Switzerland, where she received her diplome de concert in 2006. She earned a BA in musicology in 2005, and is currently studying for an MA in Cultural Analysis at the University of Amsterdam. She is also an active performer and music teacher. Arwieke has won scholarships from the Kasbank and the VSB foundations. She has been playing with The Royal Wind Music since August 2001.

JUSTIN GODOY, recorder player and composer, has recently returned to the United States from two years of studying, performing, and teaching in the Netherlands. As a winner of the Frank Huntington Beebe Grant, Justin immersed himself in the study of Italian diminutions, eventually teaching the topic at the Utrecht Conservatory. In 2005, Justin founded Harmonious Blacksmith with harpsichordist and conductor Joseph Gascho.  The ensemble, which focuses on the overlapping roles of composer and performer in the Baroque, is artist-in-residence at An Die Musik in Baltimore, and has received support from the Peabody Career Development Fund.  Justin has performed with ensembles including Hesperus, Tempesta di Mare, and Opera Vivente, and has recorded with La Donna Musicale and the National Cathedral Choir. He studied recorder with Heiko ter Schegget, Saskia Coolen, and Gwyn Roberts, and composition with Nicholas Maw.

SERGE GOUBIOUD, tenor, began singing with the Ensemble Vocal de Nantes, directed by Paul Colléaux. As a soloist, he has sung with Les Arts Florissants, directed by William Christie; Le Poème Harmonique, directed by Vincent Dumestre; Le Concert Spirituel, directed by Hervé Niquet; and Les Talents Lyriques, directed by Christophe Rousset. In 2004 and 2005, Serge Goubioud appeared in Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme (Lully-Molière) with Le Poème Harmonique, and in Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro conducted by René Jacobs at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris (Critics’ Prize 2001 for Best Operatic Performance). In May 2006, he presented his first musical show, Une nuit chez Vater Franz, based on vocal quartets by Schubert, with stage director Alain Carré. In December 2006, Serge Goubioud took the principal role (Ecclitico) in Il Mondo della Luna by Joseph Haydn, conducted by Ryo Takamura at the Hokutopia Festival in Tokyo. This year, he is again touring with Le Poème Harmonique.

LUCY GRAHAM, choreographer, graduated from the London College of Dance. She has become established as a leading exponent and choreographer of early dance over the last thirty years. Ms. Graham has received numerous commissions to mount Renaissance spectacles, ballets de cour, 18th-century ballets, and English masques, all in addition to her work in Baroque opera.  Over the years her production credits have swelled to include Handel’s Rinaldo (the Sadlers Wells Theatre), Les Caprices de Galathee and El Mestre Angles de Dansa (Musica Antiga, Barcelona), The Masque of Flowers (the Banqueting House, Whitehall), The Triumph of Love (Hampton Court Palace), Venus and Adonis, Matthew Locke’s Cupid and Death, Thomas Arne’s Comus and Thomas and Sally, Dido and Aeneas and other works of Henry Purcell (Opera Restor’d, U.K. and Europe), Rossi’s L’Orfeo (BEMF 1997, Tanglewood, Drottningholm), Orfeo ed Euridice (1999, London), Ercole Amante (BEMF 1999, Tanglewood, Utrecht), Thésée (BEMF 2001, Tanglewood), and Ariadne (BEMF 2003).  In 2005, Ms. Graham co-directed as well as choreographed Boris Goudenow (BEMF).  She particularly enjoys working in French opera, and has collaborated in numerous productions, including Rameau’s Pygmalion, Anacreon, and l’Adonis, Charpentier’s Acteon, Boismortier’s Don Quichotte chez la Duchesse, and Orfeo nell’inferno from Campra’s Le Carnaval de Venise. 

To become a singer, DONALD GREIG, baritone, followed the somewhat trying and tested route of boy chorister (Westminster Abbey) followed by choral scholar (Canterbury Cathedral), the latter whilst studying English and Film Studies at the University of Kent. After post-graduate work and an early academic career, he decided to focus on music. Comfortable with a wide range of vocal styles—from Pop to Classical, and points between—he has also published in academic journals as diverse as Early Music and Screen, and is a contributor to the forthcoming Cambridge Companion to Recorded Music. He has recently given lectures at Harvard, the University of Notre Dame, and at several conferences.  However, it is with early music that he is primarily associated, as a singer with The Tallis Scholars, Gothic Voices, the Taverner Consort, and as a founding member of The Orlando Consort.  He also devotes a considerable amount of time to the search for the perfect Pale Ale.

HESTER GROENLEER, Renaissance recorder, was born in Utrecht, and started her professional recorder studies in September 2000 at the Conservatory of Amsterdam with Paul Leenhouts. She received her diploma cum laude in June 2005, and continues her studies in the Masters Program of the Amsterdam Conservatory, where she specializes in modern improvisational art, contemporary chamber music, and Renaissance consort music. As an amateur, she was awarded prizes at the SONBU competition in Utrecht in 1998, and at the national finals of SJMN (Young Musical Talent Foundation) competition in Rotterdam in 1999. In July 2006, she won a top-talent scholarship—initiated by the Amsterdam and The Hague Conservatories and the Orpheus Instituut—for study and professional development abroad. As a member of The Royal Wind Music, a Renaissance recorder consort, she has performed in most European countries. With this ensemble she has also recorded two cds and a Dutch radio broadcast (Avro Klassiek en Concertzender).