Greatest Hits of the 1720’s
June 21 – June 22, 2018

As Apollo’s Fire prepares to head out on a festival tour, the ensemble offers two nights of baroque favorites by J.S. Bach, Vivaldi, and Handel. AF principal players take turns in the spotlight! – including Olivier Brault, Johanna Novom, Debra Nagy, and René Schiffer.

  • June 21 includes three dueling double-concertos: Bach’s fiery Concerto for Violin & Oboe, Vivaldi’s Concerto for Two Cellos, and Vivaldi’s La Folia (“Madness”).
  • June 22 includes Bach’s beloved Concerto for Two Violins and the Menuet & Badinerie from the Orchestral Suite no. 2, as well as Vivaldi’s dramatic Concerto for Four Violins.

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  • OLIVIER BRAULT
    OLIVIER BRAULT
    violin
  • JOHANNA NOVOM
    JOHANNA NOVOM
    violin
  • DEBRA NAGY
    DEBRA NAGY
    oboe
  • RENÉ SCHIFFER
    RENÉ SCHIFFER
    cello

Thursday, June 21, 2018, 7:30PM
The BATH Church (UCC)
Friday, June 22, 2018, 8:00PM
CLEVELAND Institute of Music (Kulas Hall)
PURCHASE TICKETS
SUMMER CONCERTS 2018

“The U.S.A.’s hottest baroque band.” –CLASSICAL MUSIC MAGAZINE (UK)

OLIVIER BRAULT
violin

hails from Terrebonne in Québec and brings communicative enthusiasm and scholarship to concerts throughout North America and Europe. In addition to directing the chamber ensemble Sonate 1704, he performs as Music Director with Les Goûts Réunis in Luxembourg, as a member of Four Nations Ensemble in New York, and as soloist with many Montréal-based ensembles including the Ensemble Caprice, Les Boréades de Montréal, Quatuor Franz Joseph, and Les Idées heureuses. He holds a Doctorate from the Université de Montréal, where he specialized in 18th-century violin repertoire. He has led workshops and masterclasses at the Conservatoire de Musique de Montréal, CWRU, Oberlin Conservatory, Penn State University, University of Michigan, the Conservatoire Royal de Musique de Bruxelles and The Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. He has participated in over 65 recordings, many award-winning. In 2011 he received the medal of the Assemblée Nationale de Québec for cultural contributions to his nation. Mr. Brault joined the early music faculty of McGill University in Montréal teaching baroque violin in 2017.

JOHANNA NOVOM
violin

appears as a soloist, chamber and orchestral musician with period ensembles across the US and internationally. First-prize winner of the American Bach Soloists’ International Young Artists Competition in 2008, she holds a Master’s degree in baroque violin from Oberlin Conservatory and was a Yale Baroque Ensemble fellow in 2010-2011 under the directly of Robert Mealy. Based in Brooklyn, NY, she currently performs with Trinity Wall Street Baroque Orchestra, Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Carmel Bach Festival, Clarion Music Society, Washington Cathedral Baroque Orchestra, TENET, the Sebastian Chamber Players, New York Baroque Incorporated, and ACRONYM, among others. She is a founding member of the Diderot String Quartet, a new ensemble dedicated to the performance of 18th and early 19th century repertoire. 

DEBRA NAGY
oboe

Praised for her “dazzling technique and soulful expressiveness,” (Rocky Mountain News), and a musical approach that’s “distinctly sensual…pliant, warm, and sweet,” (New York Times), Debra Nagy is one of North America’s leading performers on the baroque oboe. She plays principal oboe with the American Bach Soloists, Seattle Baroque Orchestra, and Apollo’s Fire, and is a regular guest with the Handel & Haydn Society, Boston Early Music Festival, and Portland Baroque Orchestra, among other ensembles. A dedicated chamber musician, Debra is the founder of Les Délices (whose debut recording was named “One of the Top Ten Early Music Discoveries of 2009”) and performs late-medieval music as a regular guest with Boston’s acclaimed Blue Heron and the Newberry Consort. Following studies at the Oberlin Conservatory, Conservatory of Amsterdam, and Case Western Reserve University, Debra has received many awards for her creative and scholarly pursuits including first-prize in the American Bach Soloists Young Artists Competition, a 2009 Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities, and a 2010 Creative Workforce Fellowship from Cuyahoga Arts & Culture. She has recorded over 30 CDs with repertoire ranging from 1300-1800 on the Chandos, Avie, CPO, Capstone, Bright Angel, Naxos, and ATMA labels, and has had live performances featured on CBC Radio Canada, Klara (Belgium), NPR’s Performance Today, WQXR (New York City) and WGBH Boston.

A dedicated and inspiring teacher, Debra serves on the artist faculties of the American Bach Soloists’ Summer Academy and has given masterclasses at Juilliard, the Cleveland Institute of Music, San Francisco Conservatory, Cincinnati Conservatory, and University of Washington. She is also committed to service and to fostering the next generation of leaders through her work as a board member of Early Music America and liason to its Youth Advisory Board.

In her spare time, Debra cooks prodigiously (including much canning and pickling), and she loves commuting by bicycle from her home in Cleveland’s historic Ohio City neighborhood.

WEBSITE

RENÉ SCHIFFER
cello

is praised for his “interpretive imagination and patrician command of the cello” (The Cleveland Plain Dealer). He is a native of Holland where he was a protégé of Anner Bijlsma. He later studied baroque cello with Jaap ter Linden and viola da gamba with Catharina Meints. As a member of Sigiswald Kuijken’s La Petite Bande for sixteen years, he toured four continents and appeared many times on European television. He has also performed with the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra, Les Musiciens du Louvre, and in over forty projects with Tafelmusik of Toronto. As a concerto soloist, he has appeared throughout North America and Europe, including such venues as the Royal Theatre of Madrid, and can be heard on acclaimed CD recordings of the Vivaldi Concerto for Two Cellos and the Tango Concerto for Two Gambas (his own composition) on British label AVIE. As a chamber musician, he has performed at the renowned baroque festivals of Utrecht and Bruges, as well as the Flanders Festival and Versailles. He can be heard on more than forty CD recordings, on the Harmonia Mundi, Philips, Virgin Classics, Erato, Sony, and AVIE labels. He serves on the faculty of the Cleveland Institute of Music as Teacher of Baroque Cello, and has given masterclasses and coachings for the New World Symphony (Miami), the University of Michigan, Oberlin Conservatory, and Cincinnati College-Conservatory.

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