EarlyMusicNews.Org

"Philippe Grisvard was born in Nancy in 1980. There he studied piano and oboe before entering the harpsichord class of Anne-Catherine Bücher. In 1999 he got into the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, where he studied harpsichord and basso continuo with Jesper Christensen, and pianoforte with Edoardo Torbianelli. From 2002 he's called to join La Cetra (Barockorchester Basel) where he has played under the direction of René Jacobs, Jordi Savall, and participated as continuist and répétiteur to Monteverdi's L'Incoronazione di Poppea and Rameau's Les Paladins with Konrad Junghänel. After getting his diploma in 2003, he becomes the regular harpsichordist of the ensemble Harmonie Universelle, leaded by Florian Deuter; with this group he plays as continuist and soliste threw Europe and US and made two recordings for eloquentia - Telemann and Fasch quartets and quintets (EL 0502) and Pachelbel's works for strings (EL 0606). Now Philippe lives in Paris and plays regulary with Vincent Dumestre's Le Poème Harmonique, with whom he participated since 2006, among other projects, to Molière and Lully's "Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme", staged by Benjamin Lazar, and plays with Le Concert d'Astrée (Emmanuelle Haim) and The Chamber Orchestra of Europe. " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 18, 2008 | Hits: 1584

"Marieke Spaans (b. 1972) strives for the maximum in musical expression and dialogue, combined with a thorough knowledge of early music practice. The result is a sparkling performance, full of spontaneity and deep emotions, driven by a boundless passion for the music of the 17th and 18th century.

Last student of Gustav Leonhardt, in 1997 she received her Concert and Teaching diplomas, after five years of study with this grand master of the harpsichord. Coming from this school of harpsichord playing, the keys to her performances are a refined and dynamic touch, historical awareness and respect for the composer and his intensions. Besides her harpsichord studies she studied organ and church music with Hans van Nieuwkoop and Wolfgang Zerer. She attended many master-classes, and received important impulses from musicians such as Lars-Ulrik Mortensen and Jesper Christensen. Currently she is also concentrating on fortepiano.

She was prizewinner at several renowned competitions, in 1997 at the harpsichord competition of NDR Hamburg, in 2000 at the Musica Antiqua Competition of the Flanders Festival in Bruges and at the Competition “Premio Bonporti” in Rovereto.

Marieke Spaans performs in Europe as soloist and as partner of the outstanding violinists John Holloway and Anton Steck. Her recording of W.A.Mozart's opus 1 together with Anton Steck received many rewards of the press (f.ex. "an absolute discografical highlight!" – www.klassik.com)

Marieke Spaans is Professor for Historical Keyboard Instruments at the Institute for Early Music of the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Trossingen (Germany). Before her appointment in Germany she taught at the Conservatories of Amsterdam (1994-2000) and Rotterdam (1997-2000). She teaches regularly at courses all over Europe."

Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 26, 2008 | Hits: 1081

"Johan Hofmann studied the harpsichord with Jacques Ogg and Siebe Henstra . His repertoire encloses works from the 16th, 17th, and 18th century as well as contemporary, although he specializes in music from the early and mid baroque period. His interpretations are grounded in thorough theoretical and organological knowledge and are at the same time renowned for their spontaneity and purity of style. He gave concerts in Austria , Denmark , France , Germany , Italy , Scotland , Spain , The Tsjech Republic, The United States and Sweden . In the Netherlands he regularly plays with ensembles and orchestras like The Northern Consort, Cappella Groningen, the Brabants Kamerkoor, Ensemble Occhio di Falcone (with Judith van Wanroij, Susanne Braumann and Bert Honig), the Combattimento Consort and cappella Frisae. Johan Hofmann also performed with distinguished players like Michael Chance, the Egidius Quartet, Emma Kirkby, Paul Leenhouts, Xenia Meijer, Robert Muuse and Marc Pantus. ...

Johan Hofmann teaches an international harpsichord class at the Prins Claus Conservatoire in Groningen. At the same institute he teaches thoroughbass and chambermusic. At the Conservatorium van Amsterdam Johan Hofmann teaches harpsichord and thoroughbass as minor subjects, and lectures the course “Harmony in Performance Practice”. He is also regularly invited by the conservatories in Tilburg, Zwolle, Arnhem and Enschede and gives courses in the Netherlands as well as abroad. " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 16, 2008 | Hits: 1018

“Friends of Square Pianos is a sort of on-line club for owners, potential owners, and friends of - Square Pianos!

  We are also happy to welcome owners of very old grand pianos – say before about 1840 – as they do not seem to have a website of their own. 

Our aim is to encourage ownership and enjoyment of these historic instruments, and to help owners to keep them in playing condition.  There is a special pleasure in playing (and hearing) music played on the instruments for which it was composed. ..“

Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: May 14, 2009 | Hits: 928

“Václav Luks (1970) fully developed his passion for early music while studying at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Switzerland, studying keyboard performance in the studios of
J.–A. Bötticher and J. B. Christensen. Among his activities there was the co-founding of the wind octet Amphion, and he played principal horn at the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin.
After returning to the Czech Republic, in 2005 he transformed the ensemble Collegium 1704 into a full-time baroque orchestra, and he founded Collegium Vocale 1704. He has earned renown in the world of early music not only as an outstanding player of orchestral and chamber music on the harpsichord and French horn, but also foremost as an exceptionally conductor gifted with unerring intuition and a feel for the interpretation of the works of such old masters as J. D. Zelenka, J. S. Bach and G. F. Händel.“

Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 24, 2011 | Hits: 844

"1987 Diploma in pianoforte, sotto la guida di Velia De Vita. Conservatorio “Santa Cecilia” - Roma

1992 Diploma in clavicembalo con il massimo dei voti, sotto la guida di Paola Bernardi. Conservatorio “Santa Cecilia” - Roma

Durante il corso della sua formazione musicale si è dedicato allo studio dell’organo, con particolare approfondimento della musica sacra con il mons. Domenico Bartolucci. " See site for more info. (ed.)

Added on: Feb 02, 2008 | Hits: 836

"I began studying piano with my mother at age three on the Niagara Peninsula (Canada). I later studied violin with Artur Garami and keyboard with Eric Dowling. My childhood inspiration was a series of articles about Vladimir Horowitz in Etude Magazine.

By the age of sixteen I was an Associate of the Royal Conservatory of Toronto. I was introduced to the harpsichord and Fenton House by Thurston Dart in London England, to gamba making by Juliet Beamont of Cambridge, and to the baroque violin by Alice Harnoncourt.

For a variety of reasons, I took time out from a music career to raise five wonderful children: a minister, a teacher, a scientist, a guitar maker and a writer. When they were grown up, I cashed in my pension and returned to my music.

Originally, I planned to record all copyright-free works for the harpsichord in General MIDI format for free distribution on the Internet. If you enjoy the trip, who cares if you get there! But, something happened on the way - the trip got nasty.

I play for myself now. " See site for more info. (ed.)

Added on: Feb 02, 2008 | Hits: 783

Facebook site for Gustav Leonhardt.

“Gustav Leonhardt (born 30 May 1928, 's-Graveland) is a highly acclaimed Dutch keyboard player, conductor, musicologist, teacher and editor. Leonhardt has been a leader in the movement to perform music on period instruments. The keyboard instruments on which he has performed and recorded include the harpsichord, pipe organ, claviorganum (a combination of a harpsichord and an organ), clavichord, and fortepiano. .. “

Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Jun 05, 2010 | Hits: 718

The Association of Clavecin en France is a collection point for professional/amateur harpsichordists, makers, musicologists, composer on a national scale in France. Please see site for more information. / "Ce site s’adresse aux clavecinistes professionnels ou amateurs, luthiers, musicologues, compositeurs... Vous trouverez dans la rubrique Association une présentation de l’association, ses prochaines activités, et un bulletin d’adhésion à télécharger. "

Added on: Feb 14, 2006 | Hits: 707

“Ana Paula Segurola Pita started her harpsichord studies with Eduardo Gilardoni (scholarship of the Mercedes Olivera Foundation, 1990-91), and has since then attended master-classes with renowned harpsichordists like Jacques Ogg, José Luis González Uriol, Mario Videla, Edmundo Hora, Alessandro Santoro and Françoise Lengellé among others, and with musicologists like Bruno Turner and Kelley Harness.

She studied with Edmundo Hora at the State University of Campinas and with professor Ilton Wjuniski and his assistant Maria Eugênia Sacco at the Magda Tagliaferro Foundation in São Paulo.

Former piano student of Raquel Boldorini, she took lessons with Eliane Richepin (Annecy, France, 1997), and attended master-classes with foreign pianists performing in Montevideo, between 1991 and 2000.

At present, she studies Organ as a disciple of Cristina García Banegas at the University in Uruguay. ..”

Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 12, 2010 | Hits: 617

"French pianist Claire Chevallier (°1969) combined the study of the piano at the musical academies of Nancy, Strasbourg (Hélène Boschi) and Paris (Bruno Rigutto) with her traditional studies in mathematics and physics.

She then continued her musical education at the Conservatoire Royal de Bruxelles with Jean-Claude Vanden Eynden and Guy Van Waas, where she was awarded first prize in piano and chamber music. She became fascinated with the fortepiano during her studies via a master class given by Jos van Immerseel. She began to concentrate on the historical background and the evolution in the "construction" of the fortepiano, and for a number of years studied the specific characteristics and maintenance requirements (tuning, strings, etc) of the instrument completely on her own. She thus developed extensive expertise in historical keyboards as fortepiano specialist and as pianist.

As musician-researcher, she began her own collection of French historical keyboards, which has grown in the meantime to 5 instruments covering the time span 1842-1920. ... " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Jul 16, 2008 | Hits: 608

"After training as a pianist and organist, Emmanuelle Haïm studied the harpsichord with Kenneth Gilbert and graduated from the Paris Conservatoire (CNSM) with several premiers prix. Her love for the human voice led her to concentrate after that on conducting vocal music, first of all at the Versailles Centre for Baroque Music (CMBV), then at the Paris Conservatoire. She was soon invited to accompany many distinguished singers in recital, and she developed a regular activity as a continuo player as well. ...

In 2000 Emmanuelle Haïm gathered together a group of accomplished singers and instrumentalists who shared not only a great musical experience, but also a common temperament and a stylistic approach that is both expressive and natural. Thus she formed her own Baroque music ensemble, Le Concert d’Astrée. And within three years she had taken it from success to success, appearing at venues from Paris to New York, as well as at festivals in France and abroad. " See website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Feb 24, 2008 | Hits: 599

"The Deutsche Clavichord Societaet (DCS, German Clavichord Society), a registered non-profit society, was founded in 1993.

The DCS is a focus for every aspect of the clavichord and its music, especially for the revival of clavichord playing and its tradition. Further activities include lectures, publications, the support of research studies, archive of clavichords.

Its membership includes professional players, amateurs, makers of clavichords, restorers, musicologists and people who simply like the delicate sound of the clavichord.

The DCS holds clavichord days (Clavichordtage) which include concerts, courses, workshops on clavichord maintenance and tuning, exhibitions of instruments, lectures... "

See site for more info. (ed.)

Added on: Feb 02, 2008 | Hits: 581

"Considered one of the best Brazilian harpsichord players, Rosana Lanzelotte has played in important halls throughout her country as well as in Europe, including recitals at the Wigmore Hall and St. Martin-in-the-fields (London), Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation (Lisbon) and Palazzo Barberini (Rome). Rosana has released four solo CDs, among which the first recording on the harpsichord of The Seven Last Words by Haydn. Her CD The Brazilian Harpsichord, totally devoted to Brazilian music of the XXth century, has been pointed out as one of the five best releases of the year. Her next project features unknown Portuguese works to be recorded on the XVIIIth century Calisto harpsichord owned by the National Music Museum in the US.

As a researcher, she devotes herself to the area of Music Information Retrieval, developing techniques for effective availability of musical archives through the Internet.

For ten years, she has been running one of the most remarkable musical series in Rio - “Music in the Churches” – which concerts take place all over the city, including its poorest regions and “favelas”. Some outstanding artists played in the series, such as Heinz Holliger, Christophe Rousset, Accademia Bizantina and Ensemble Zefiro.

Due to her achievements, she has been awarded with the “Golfinho de Ouro” prize by the Cultural Council of Rio de Janeiro. " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Mar 24, 2008 | Hits: 576

"Boyd McDonald began his career as a pianist giving his Wigmore Hall debut in 1960 followed by a New York Debut in 1963 as winner of the Leschetizky Town Hall Debut Prize. He toured North America, Europe and England as a member of the Beckett and McDonald Piano Duo. Since 1982 he has been an active fortepianist recording the Complete Works for Cello and Fortepiano by Beethoven with Paul Pulford. As an academic he taught composition at the University of Manitoba. He joined the Faculty of Music at Wilfrid Laurier University in 1976 where he currently teaches piano as Professor Emeritus. As a composer McDonald studied with Murray Adaskin, three years with Nadia Boulanger o­n a Canada Council grant and summer schools with Darius Milhaud, John Cage and Stefan Wolpe. His works display a synthesis of virtuosity combined with a theatricality valued by performers whose concerts must be seen as well as heard!" ...

Added on: Jul 09, 2005 | Hits: 560

“ The  mandate of the Association Clavecin en France is to promote:

• the performance of harpsichord, clavichords and related instruments
• the repertoire available for these instruments
• the composition of newer works for these instruments
• the exchange of information between harpsichordists and all those interested in this field“
  

Added on: Apr 18, 2009 | Hits: 560

"After completing his modern piano degree at the Royal Conservatory at The Hague in 1983, Bart van Oort studied fortepiano with Stanley Hoogland, also at the Royal Conservatory. In 1986 he won the first prize and the special Audience prize at the Mozart Fortepiano Competition in Brugges, Belgium, and he subsequently studied with Malcolm Bilson at Cornell University (Ithaca, NY), receiving a Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Historical Performance Practice in 1993. He has performed at festivals in Utrecht, Florence, Berlin, Antwerp, Brugges, Melbourne, Brisbane, York, Montpellier, Moscow, and Esterhaza, in the USA and New Zealand, and has given lectures and master classes at the conservatories of Brussels, Paris, Moscow, Helsinki, Oslo, Bucharest, Sofia, Moscow, Stavanger, Perugia, Sydney, Adelaide, Wellington, Melbourne, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Juilliard, Bloomington, and Western Ontario. Since 1997 Van Oort has made more than forty recordings of chamber music and solo repertory, including the prize-winning 4-CD box set The Art of the Nocturne in the Nineteenth Century, the Complete Haydn Piano Trios (10 CDs) with his ensemble the Van Swieten Society, and with four other fortepianists, the Complete Haydn Piano Sonatas. In 2005 Bart van Oort completed a ten-year, 14-CD recording project, the Complete Works for Piano solo and Piano four-hands of Mozart, which was released during the Mozart Year 2006. Bart van Oort teaches fortepiano and is a lecturer in Historical Performance Practice at the Royal Conservatory in The Hague (The Netherlands). " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Jul 16, 2008 | Hits: 552

"Michael Borgstede lives in Tel Aviv and works as both Middle East correspondent for the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung as well as a harpsichordist and organist. As a soloist and member of the ensemble Musica ad Rhenum he has toured almost all European countries, the United States, Asia, South America and the Middle East. Michael Borgstede regularly performs at venues like the Wigmore Hall in London, the Konzerthaus in Vienna and the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam.While still a student at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague he won the BenWeber Award and the York Early Music Competition. He has participated in morethan twenty CD-productions, among which are the Complete Chamber Music of Francois Couperin with the ensemble Musica ad Rhenum. Summer 2006 saw the release of the Complete hrpsichord music of Couperin on the Brilliant Classics label (11 CDs), which was praised by the press and received several distinctions. Apart from his extensiveconcert activities Michael Borgstede is invited regularly to hold masterclasses und give lectures on controversial aspects of Historical Performance Practice. He always strives for an interpretation full of contrast and dramawhich does justice to the rhetoric and affect of baroque music. This search haslead him to “crack some dogmas of Historically Informed Performance Practice”(Tagesanzeiger). The results are “sometimes unusual, but always inventive, lively and musicologically sound interpretations” (El Pais). He has also published a book on the ethnic diversity of Israeli society. " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Jun 22, 2008 | Hits: 545

"Susanne Pumhösl lives in Vienna, where she works as a freelance musician and teaches at Konservatorium Wien University. She began her career as a soloist in 1996, after taking first place at the International Johann Heinrich Schmelzer Competition at Melk Monastery with the virtuoso baroque aria “Vo far Guerra” from G.F. Handel’s opera “Rinaldo”.
br> Her solo and chamber music activities—with the ensembles Capella Leopoldina and Private musicke—have been documented in numerous CD and radio recordings and have received several awards. ... " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Jul 14, 2008 | Hits: 539

"Well known in the New York area, Rebecca Pechefsky has performed in such venues as Carnegie Hall’s Weill Recital Hall, Merkin Hall, and the eighteenth-century Morris-Jumel Mansion, where she is co-director of the early-music series Music at
Morris-Jumel. Outside New York she has been heard at the Boston Early Music Festival and in the concert series of the San Diego Harpsichord Society; the Harpsichord Center (Pasadena and Brentwood, California); the Miami Bach Society; the Zoellner Arts Center at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania; and the  Beeville Concert Association in Beeville, Texas.

A frequent performer at the American Festival of Microtonal Music, she can be heard on its recent compact discs Early and Odysseus (by Johnny Reinhard). For Quill Classics she has recorded a recital of works by Brunnemüller, Bach, and La Guerre
(QC 1001), the complete harpsichord music of François d’Agincour (QC 1002 and 1004), and Bach and His Circle (QC 1006). With Andrew Bolotowsky she has recorded sonatas by Johann Ludwig Krebs for Baroque flute and harpsichord (QC
1003) and flute works by J. S. Bach (also with cellist David Bakamjian; QC 1008, forthcoming). With Brooklyn Baroque, of which she is a founding member (with Bolotowsky and Bakamjian), she can be heard on Northern Lights (QC 1005), a
program of German Baroque works, and The Pleasures of the French (QC 1007), a recital of eighteenth-century French works. (For more information on Brooklyn Baroque, click on the button to the left.) Her recording of Bach's Well-Tempered Clavier, Book I, was released in May 2009. Her recordings have been played across the United States on NPR stations, and Bach and His Circle won the 2009 Just Plain Folks Music Award for best Classical Solo Album.

Also committed to new music, Ms. Pechefsky has premiered works by Mary Inwood, Graham Lynch, Frank J. Oteri, Louis Pelosi, Johnny Reinhard, and Ben Yarmolinsky. In March, she gave the world premiere of Graham Lynch’s prizewinning Petenera at the Aliénor Competition in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. Currently organist at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Glendale, Queens, she lives in Brooklyn with her husband, Erik Ryding, with whom she has coauthored Bruno Walter: A World
Elsewhere, winner of an ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award. ...“

Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Jun 17, 2005 | Hits: 534

"Cynthia Hiebert has performed both traditional and contemporary harpsichord works in Canada, the United States and England. She studied with Colin Tilney and Arthur Haas, and as a recipient of the Gelber Fellowship, completed a doctorate in harpsichord performance at the State University of New York at Stony Brook. In addition to work as a soloist, she has collaborated with numerous ensembles including New York Baroque, North Shore Pro Musica, I Furiosi, Spiritus, Numus, the York Symphony Orchestra, the Penderecki String Quartet, the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony Orchestra and the Nota Bene Period Orchestra." ...

Added on: Jul 22, 2005 | Hits: 527

"Harpsichordist Jason J. Moy holds the Bachelor of Harpsichord Performance and Master of Early Music Performance degrees from McGill University in Montreal, where he trained under Hank Knox and Luc Beauséjour. In addition to his principal teachers, he received much valuable guidance from Bruce Haynes, Jory Vinikour, and other mentors. Jason has concertized extensively in the United States, Canada, and Europe; currently based in his native Chicago, he wrapped up his Montreal sojourn this past year by performing J.S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations, and the Fifth Brandenburg Concerto with the McGill Baroque Orchestra. While he loves the solo repertoire, particularly that of eighteenth-century Germany and France, Jason is especially fond of chamber music. His continuo playing, on organ and harpsichord, has been described as both “highly rhetorical” and “sensitive and very vibrant.” See website for more details. (ed.)

Added on: Feb 16, 2008 | Hits: 519

"For over 30 years Hendrik Bouman has counted among the most innovative and respected specialists of early music. Prolific composer of music written in the baroque and classical styles prevalent in 17th and 18th Century Italy, France, Germany, England and Spain, he has played a critical role in integrating contemporary period composition and free improvisation in historical style into the early music movement. His innovative compositions and improvisations, as well as his original basso continuo realisations and transcriptions of historic repertoire, have become a reference in the field of early music today. " Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Mar 24, 2008 | Hits: 517

“Originally from Bath, Claire studied piano, harpsichord, clavichord and fortepiano at the Royal College of Music.  She graduated in 1999 with a BMus and two diplomas to her name, having won a clutch of prizes and awards along the way.

Since graduating from the RCM just over a decade ago, Claire has performed with a wide range of ensembles in both the UK and abroad.  She is a regular member of Baroque Encounter Trio, and has recently joined both Musica Secreta and Il Festino as their principal continuo player. As well as specialising in Baroque chamber music, Claire has worked with many orchestras and conductors, including Walter Reiter, Philip Thorby, Alison Bury and Steven Devine.
 
Claire has recently completed a Master’s degree at Trinity College of Music, studying harpsichord and chamber organ with James Johnstone, supported by a full scholarship. She is now putting her energies into other projects, and remains much in demand as a performer and educator. Claire teaches piano at St Dunstan’s College, is a staff accompanist at Trinity College of Music and is also a regular tutor on the Early Music For Youth Summer School. She can also occasionally be found shark diving, having recently qualified as a PADI Open Water Scuba Diver. ”

Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 18, 2010 | Hits: 512

“Léon Berben was born in 1970 in Heerlen (the Netherlands), but has been living for several years in Cologne (Germany). He studied harpsichord and organ in Den Haag (Koninklijk Conservatorium) and Amsterdam (Sweelinck Conservatorium) with Rienk Jiskoot, Bob van Asperen, Ton Koopman and Gustav Leonhardt, and finished his studies with solo-diploma for both instruments.

Since March 2000 he has been the harpsichordist with Musica Antiqua Köln (Reinhard Goebel). As such he has given concerts all over the world, travelling throughout Europe, Asia, North- and South America and has recorded several CDs for Deutsche Grammophon / Archiv Produktion. Musica Antiqua Köln dissolved at the end of November 2006, and Léon Berben has since focussed his work on chamber music and, increasingly, on the solo-repertoire.

He gives solo-recitals on harpsichord and organ. His solo-CDs on historic organs and harpsichords - above all with the labels Ramée and Aeolus - have been highly acclaimed in the press, and received numerous awards, including the »Vierteljahrespreis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik« and »Choc« of Le Monde de la Musique. ..“ Visit website for more information. (ed.)

Added on: Apr 27, 2009 | Hits: 510