Redefining, Reimagining, Reinventing Early Music Over the last two generations, the historical performance movement has given the world both a vast and growing body of rediscovered masterworks and whole new ways of understanding and hearing the music of past eras. We have reinvented early music in our reconstructions of lost technologies and performance practices. We […]
Special Concert May 4–6 Celebrates Trebles in Paradise For many people, what first drew us to early music, what caught our minds’ ear, was the sonority of the instruments on which we heard the music performed. Whether it was the subtle delicacy of a lute or the raw power of a shawm band, they were […]
Call for proposals: 2018–19 Series SFEMS is accepting concert proposals for the California Jazz Conservatory/SFEMS Early Music Sundays 2018–19 series. Participation in this series is open to SFEMS Affiliates and members of SFEMS. All performances in this series take place on Sunday afternoons at 4:30 p.m. Programs should be approximately one hour in length with […]
California Bach Society to Perform Magnificent Vesper Psalms Artistic Director Paul Flight leads the award-winning California Bach Society in stunning works from GF Handel’s 1707 Vespers service at the Carmelite church of Santa Maria in Montesanto in Rome. We perform three magnificent psalm settings: Nisi Dominus, Laudate Pueri Dominum, and Dixit Dominus. The 30-voice chorus […]
This spring, Vajra Voices is excited to announce its latest initiative: a one-day vocal workshop on Le Lai de la Fonteinne by Guillaume de Machaut (ca. 1300–1377), supported in part by a grant from the California Arts Council in partnership with the San Francisco Early Music Society. This landmark work by one of the titans of […]
The world-famous Headlands Workshop sponsored by the East Bay Recorder Society has moved to an every-other-year schedule, with the next full weekend event happening in May 2019. But we couldn’t go a whole year without some multi-faculty fun, so for 2018 we are doing “Headlands in Berkeley.” This workshop is Saturday, May 19 from 9:00 […]
Tish Berlin will be offering four different classes for upper intermediate to advanced recorder players in May and June. Two separate classes will be offered on Wednesdays from 1:00 to 2:30 p.m. and from 3:00-4:30 p.m., May 16–30 and June 13. Johann Sebastian Bach’s Art of Fugue will be the subject of the 1:00 p.m. […]
You are cordially invited to the SFEMS Garden in the Hills House Concert taking place on Sunday, May 19, from 1:30 to 4:00 p.m., at the home of Dr. Carol Baird and Alan Harper. This special party and concert will benefit the 2018 Berkeley Festival and Exhibition. Music, The event features wine, hors d’oeuvres, and […]
Norman Larson, who passed away on February 20, has been a friend to the Bay Area’s early music community for 4 decades. An enthusiastic concertgoer and generous supporter of the arts and historical heritage, especially in his native San Francisco, he was beloved and will be missed by many friends in the Bay Area. SFEMS […]
The new year’s Sunday Afternoon concert series at the California Jazz Conservatory concludes on April 15 with a special program celebrating the 16th Amendment to the US Constitution. Les Violettes (Corey Carleton, soprano; David Wilson, violin; Colin Shipman, viola da gamba; and Violet Grgich, harpsichord) perform music from the Court of Leopold I, Holy Roman […]
