the concord ensemble

Founded in 1997 as an a cappella sextet of male voices, The Concord Ensemble has received numerous accolades, including the Grand Prize in the First Early Music America/Dorian Recording Competition, and the Competition in Performance of Hispano American Music. The Ensemble’s debut recording, The Victory of Santiago: Voices of Renaissance Spain earned them the prized “5-Star” distinction in Goldberg Magazine.

Since making Los Angeles their home base in 2003, The Concord Ensemble has gone co-ed, allowing the group to explore and present the broadest possible spectrum of superlative mixed and equal-voiced musical literature from the Medieval to the present day. The Ensemble has been extremely successful in translating their critically-acclaimed musicianship across multiple configurations, delighting audiences throughout the United States.

Recent performance highlights include presentation of three programs for male sextet, including the a cappella music of Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, a concert of old and new featuring works by Perotin and Stephen Hartke, and Concord’s unique holiday offering of medieval and modern carols. The gentlemen presented the Ensemble’s holiday concert in three sold-out performances for the San Francisco Early Music Society. Concord’s mixed formation has also been busy, presenting an all-Tallis program in celebration of the composer’s 500th birthday, and a semi-staged performance of Henry Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, in collaboration with Musica Angelica Baroque Orchestra in Los Angeles.

The Concord Ensemble has toured extensively through the United States and in Europe, with performances in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Dallas, Cleveland, Dayton, Madison, Philadelphia, Washington, D.C., and Regensburg, Germany, to name but a few. Their work has been broadcast nationally on NPR by Angela Mariani, producer for the nationally-syndicated program Harmonia. Most recently the ensemble toured the northeastern United States, anchored by a residency at Syracuse University, a series of master classes and performances at Vassar University, and a return engagement at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C. for a program featuring the music of Thomas Morley and Luca Marenzio. The Concord Ensemble also reprised its collaboration with Musica Angelica and presented Dido and Aeneas as part of the gala celebrations surrounding the reopening of the Getty Villa in Malibu, California, and performed new transcriptions of two unpublished oratorios by Giacomo Carissimi with the southern California-based women’s trio Voxfire.

Highlights for the 2006-2007 season include a collaboration with the Pennington Dance Group in a performance of Alexander Zemlinsky Lieder, a project of music from the Munich Hofkapelle of Orlando di Lasso with Piffaro, and more concerts with the baroque ensemble Musica Angelica in music ranging from John Blow and Henry Purcell to salon music of the American forefathers.

The Concord Ensemble has recorded two CDs available commercially through Amazon.com and at the Ensemble’s website; both recordings were made under the Dorian label. For additional information regarding The Concord Ensemble and for booking information, please visit our website at www.concordensemble.com.