by Timothy Robson
On Thursday evening, June 16 at Baroque Music Barn in Hunting Valley, Apollo’s Fire’s Countryside Concerts presented a new show, “My Island Home: Songs and Stories of Newfoundland,” created by Meredith Hall and Sylvain Bergeron in cooperation with Montréal’s Ensemble La Nef.
by Daniel Hathaway
“If people liked ‘Sacrum Mysterium: A Celtic Christmas,’ they’ll know how great it is when you mix La Nef in with Apollo’s Fire people,” soprano Meredith Hall said in a recent telephone conversation.
Hall, who starred in that earlier show, returns to Cleveland this week to rejoin Sylvain Bergeron of Montréal’s Ensemble La Nef; Apollo’s Fire soloists Susanna Gilmore, fiddle, Kathie Stewart, flutes, and Tina Bergmann, hammered dulcimer; and other members of the Countryside Concerts ensemble for six performances of a new summer program called “My Island Home: Songs and Stories of Newfoundland.” [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Apollo’s Fire has released details of its summer Countryside Concerts for June and July of 2016, which will include two shows.
June 16-20 — My Island Home: songs and stories of Newfoundland will feature Meredith Hall, soprano, Sylvain Bergeron, lute, and members of Apollo’s Fire and La Nef of Montréal. A rustic celebration of the music of Hall’s homeland with fiddles, flutes, harp, gamba, percussion, and hammered dulcimer. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
Apollo’s Fire will present seven local subscription programs totaling thirty concerts during its 23rd season in 2014-2015. Additionally, Cleveland’s baroque orchestra will make its debut at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art in December and at London’s BBC Proms next August, undertake a national tour of Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers in November, and appear on the Pittsburgh Renaissance & Baroque Society series in April. [Read more…]
by Mike Telin
Since it premiered in December of 2011, Apollo’s Fire’s Sacrum Mysterium – A Celtic Christmas, has become a holiday favorite of area audiences. From Tuesday, December 3 through December 8 at locations through Northeast Ohio, Jeannette Sorrell and Apollo’s Fire will present five performances of their acclaimed production that celebrates Celtic artistic traditions, interweaving Renaissance choral music with ancient pagan carols, folk dances and joyous fiddle tunes.
A colorful band of bagpipes, flutes, strings, and Celtic harp will join Apollo’s Singers. The performances also mark the return of three of Apollo’s Fire’s favorite guest artists — Canadian soprano Meredith Hall, British baroque guitarist and step dancer Steve Player and hammered dulcimer virtuoso Tina Bergmann.
ClevelandClassical.com reviewer William Fazekas called Sacrum Mysterium “…a careful balance of the familiar and the exotic [that includes] traditional Christmas songs [such as] The Coventry Carol, [and] early music standards” such as the 17th century Scottish carol Come, My Children Dere, and the instrumental numbers Scotch Cap and Wild Geese.” [Read more…]