by Daniel Hathaway
Apollo’s Fire was among the Grammy winners for classical music announced in Los Angeles on February 10. The award in the Best Solo Vocal Album category was given for the ensemble’s Avie recording, Songs of Orpheus, featuring tenor Karim Sulayman. Conductor Jeannette Sorrell led an ensemble that included Julie Andrijeski, Johanna Novom, Karina Schmitz, René Schiffer, Rebecca Landell Reed, William Simms, and Brian Kay.
The album, which features 17th-century songs on the Orpheus legend by Monteverdi, Caccini, Landi, and d’India, as well as instrumental music by Castello and Cima, was produced by Erica Brenner, recorded by Ian Dobie, and mixed and mastered by Daniel Shores.
Click here to watch a view-from-the-audience video of the exciting moment when Apollo’s Fire’s first Grammy award was announced on Sunday. Songs of Orpheus can be ordered directly from Apollo’s Fire’s website.
It happens that Sorrell, Novom, Schiffer, Schmitz, and Landell Reed are all Oberlin Conservatory graduates — and a number of other “Obies” were honored at the Grammys this time around as well. Read about them here.
Published on ClevelandClassical.com February 11, 2019.
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