~
Period Instrument chamber music from six centuries
around the Salish Sea ~ Please
sign our mailing
list for updated schedule announcements
(please specify preferred concert location)
~
Please
see specific
2026 infofor
each location throughlinks to
the left ~
André
Danican Philidor l'ainé, the
aging Louis XIV's long-time
music librarian, prepared the
king's favorite operas and
ballets alongside chamber
music by Lully and Philidor
himself
for little evening concerts
given before his majesty, all
reduced for a smaller number of
musicians who presented these
grand works in the intimate
setting greatly preferred during
this period by the king, at
least a quarter of a century
after the death of the composer
of most of these works,
Jean-Baptiste Lully.
★
★ ★
~
Little Concert
for Louis ~
•
Monday
noon, January
19 on Vashon
Island
at 12:00 noon •
•
Monday
evening, January 19 in Tacoma
at 7:00 PM•
•
Tuesday
evening, January
20
in Vancouver
at 7:00 PM •
•
Wednesday,
January
21
in the Skagit
Valley(Mount
Vernon) at
7:00 PM •
•
Thursday, January
22
in Seattle
at 7:00 PM (not 7:30!)
•
Olena Zhukova from Kyiv and Les Voix
humaines, the widely celebrated
prize-winning duo of viols from
Montreal join us for a program
illuminating a radically evolving
musical perspective through the 17th
century.
★
★ ★
~
Italy and
France ~
•
Monday
evening, February
9
onWhidbey
Island(Coupeville)
at
7:00 PM (not
7:30!) • • Tuesday
early evening, February
10
on Orcas
Island at 5:00 PM
•
•
Wednesday
evening, February
11
in the Skagit
Valley(Mount
Vernon) at
7:00 PM •
•
Thursday,
February
12
in Seattle
at 7:00 PM (not 7:30!) •
— EUROPEAN
TOUR 1690-1790
· Olena Zhukova,
harpsichord
· Jeffrey Cohan,
baroque flute
An excursion through a century of
transformation and diversity by decade
and culture within the baroque and
classical periods, through the
perspective of composers for harpsichord
and flute from
Ukraine, France,
Italy, Scotland, Germany and Austria
with music by Berezofzkyj, Boismortier,
Corelli, Oswald, Mozart and Bach.
Olena Zhukova of Kyiv,
Ukraine, a leading harpsichordist
and a tireless ambassador for
early music in her country and
abroad, has
performed since the outbreak of
full-scale war in prominent
performances sponsored by
distinguished institutions all
around Ukraine, Poland, Austria,
France, Switzerland and Czech
Republic for international
festivals and in collaboration
with major artists, orchestras and
opera productions. Ms. Zhukova is
also an accomplished scholar who
published and presented more than
20 articles, while devoting
herself to her harpsichord class
and chamber music students as
Associate Professor at both the National
Music Academy of Ukraine and
the Gliére Academy of Music
(Kiev), where she founded the
harpsichord class. Recent
engagements during the past few
months alone include Bach's
Goldberg Variations in the
prestigious Organ Hall in
Lviv, Ukraine; the first major
classical performance for the
public in Chernihiv,
Ukraine since
the outbreak of war entitled French
Music in Times of War
and sponsored by the Ambassador of
France, in a newly rebuilt
performance hall in Chernihiv that
had previously been extensively
damaged by a Russian strike at the
beginning of the conflict; and an
involved program, consisting
exclusively of new music for
harpsichord composed
in part for her
by today's Ukrainian composers,
for Columbia University’s Global
Center in Paris and its Institute
for Ideas and Imagination.
Innovative
renditions of renaissance
Psalms (~1620), Irish and Scottish
baroque (~1720) and folk music as
interpreted during Beethoven's
lifetime (~1820) outlines this 100%
new program continuing Oleg and
Jeffrey's exploration of settings
from three centuries of popular and
folk music, performed on 5
transverse flutes and three plucked
instruments.
Two experiments in particular are
worth of mention. In the early 17th
century Flutist Jacob Van Eyck and
lutenist Nicolas Vallet both wrote
settings of many of the Psalm tunes
from the Geneva Psalter of the
mid-16th century. Timofreyev and
Cohan juxtapose these in a manner
that sheds new light on early
17th-century improvisational
practice.
James Oswald's "Airs for the
Seasons" consists of four
collections, one for each season, of
about 24 airs or multi-movement
suites, each dedicated to a
particular flower of the season and
radiating the charming character of
the folk melodies of Oswald's native
Scotland. The wire strung English
guitar, so rarely to be heard today,
emerged around this time as one of
the most prominent instruments of
home life in England, and Oswald's
airs beautifully suit Oleg's
instrument made in 1767 alongside
the one-keyed baroque flute.
LISTEN:
Oleg Timofeyev and
Jeffrey Cohan play Drouet's God
Save the Queen on SoundCloud:
•
Tuesday
evening, March24
in Vancouver
at 7:00 PM •
•
Saturday
evening, March
28 in Colvilleat
6:00 PM•
April
23-May 1, 2026:
—TELEMANN
PARIS QUARTETS
· David Greenberg,
baroque violin
· Susie
Napper, viola da
gamba
· Elisabeth
Wright, harpsichord
· Jeffrey
Cohan, baroque flute
Six
quatuors
(1730):
Concerto
1 in G
Sonata
1 in A
Suite
1 in e
Nouveaux
quatuors en six suites
(1738): 2e.
Quatuor in A Minor
Telemann composed his 12
brilliant “Paris Quartets” in
Hamburg and then Paris in
response to a request in 1730
from the most famous Parisian
flute, violin and cello virtuosi
which resulted in his most
significant journey away from
home during his lifetime. This
year we present four new
quartets, to include a selection
from each of his four sets of
quartets in sonata, suite and
concerto format.
"The admirable performances of
these quartets by Messrs Blavet
(transverse flute), Guignon
(violin), the younger Forcroy
[i.e. Forqueray] (viola da gamba)
and Edouard (cello) would be worth
describing were it possible for
words to be found to do them
justice. In short, they won the
attention of the ears of the court
and the town, and procured for me
in a very little time an almost
universal renown and increased
esteem."
★
★ ★
~
Telemann Paris
Quartets ~
•
Thursday
early evening,
April23
on Orcas
Island
at 5:00 PM •
Vocal masterworks to be
presented include 6 of Handel's
9 exquisite German
Arias, selected arias
from cantatas by Bach, his Italian
Concerto for solo
harpsichord, and flute sonata by
Handel and Bach's cantata
Ich habe genug.
★
★ ★
~
Bach &
Handel ~
•
Tuesday
early evening, May
5
on Orcas
Island
at 5:00 PM •
Hans-Jürgen Schnoor, often
organist at the St. Marien
Kirche to which Bach walked for
three days to hear Dietrich
Buxtehude, has performed the
Goldberg Variations more than
125 times, possibly more than
any other living harpsichordist.
★
★ ★
•
Thursday,
May
21
in Seattle
only at 7:00
PM (not 7:30!)
•
Award-winning
harpsichordist Irene Roldán
(www.ireneroldan.com)
was born in southern Spain in 1997.
Described by the press as one of the most
prominent Spanish harpsichordists on the
international scene (ABC Sevilla), Irene
currently lives and works in Basel,
Switzerland. She gained international
recognition in 2021, when she won first
prize, never previously awarded in this
competition, as well as the audience prize
at the III. International Harpsichord
Competition «Città di Milano». In the same
year, her ensemble Flor Galante secured
the first prize at the IV. International
Bach Competition in Berlin. One year
later, Irene was honored with the
prestigious Bach Prize and an additional
special award at the XXXIII. International
Bach Competition held in Leipzig, Germany.
★
★ ★
~
Roldan &
Cohan: Bach
~
• Saturday
noon-thirty, June 6
in Friday
Harbor at 12:30 PM
•
•
Saturday,
June
6
on Lopez
Island at
6:00 PM (not 6:30!) •
•
Sunday
afternoon, June
7
in Port
Townsend
at 2:00 PM• • Sunday
evening, June
7 onWhidbey
Island(Freeland)
at
7:30 PM (not 7:00!) •
•
Monday
noon, June
8
on Vashon
Island
at 12:00 noon
•
•
Monday
evening, June
8
in Tacoma
at 7:00 PM• •
Tuesday
evening, June
9
in Vancouver
at 7:00 PM •
•
Wednesday
early evening, June
10
on Orcas
Island
at 5:00 PM •
•
Thursday,
June
11
in Seattle
at 7:00 PM (not
7:30!) •
•
Wednesday,
June
17
in the Skagit
Valley(Mount
Vernon) at
7:00 PM •
Irene
Roldàn’s
participation
in these
performances
has been made
possible with
help from the
Honorary
Consulate of
Spain in
Seattle and
from to the
Programme for
the
Internationalisation
of Spanish
Culture (PICE)
of Acción
Cultural
Española
(AC/E), which
seeks to
promote
Spanish
culture
through the
inclusion of
Spanish
artists and
creators
residing in
Spain in the
programming of
cultural
events outside
of Spain.
June
25-July 2, 2025:
—PARDESSUS DE VIOLE,
FLUTE & GUITAR
· Annalisa
Pappano, pardessus de
viol and treble viol
· William Simms, baroque
guitar and theorbo
· Jeffrey Cohan, baroque
flute
The
French royal court musical establishment
generated a vast amount of music, to be
represented by works of Jean-Baptiste
Lully, Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre,
Marin Marais, Jacques Hotteterre and
others.
★
★ ★
~
The French
Perspective ~
•
Thursday
evening, June
25
in Vancouver
at 7:00 PM •
•
Tuesday
early evening, June
30
on Orcas
Island
at 5:00 PM •
•
Wednesday,
July
1
in the Skagit
Valley
(Mount Vernon)
at
7:00 PM •
•
Thursday,
July
2
in Seattle
at 7:00 PM (not
7:30!) •
★
★
★
★
★
★
★
★
★
★
★
★
In
1676, Thomas Mace expresses our
musical aspirations: "I have been
more Sensibly, Fervently, and
Zealously Captivated, and drawn into
Divine Raptures, and Contemplations,
by Those Unexpressible Rhetorical,
Uncontroulable Perswasions, and
Instructions of Musicks Divine
Language."
Sloane
wrote in about 1794 that "There must
be an Order and just Proportion,
Intricacy with Simplicity in the
Component parts, Variety in the
Mass, and Light and Shadow in the
whole, so as to produce the varied
sensations of gaiety and melancholy,
of wildness and even surprise and
wonder…"
As Thomas Mace says in 1676: "…When
we come to be Masters… we can
command all manner of Time, at our
own Pleasures; we Then take Liberty
for Humour and good Adornment-sake,
to Break Time; sometimes Faster,
sometimes Slower, as we perceive,
the Nature of the Thing Requires,
which…adds much Grace and Luster to
the Performance."
★
★
★ ★
★
★ ★
★
★ ★
★ ★
•
•
•
ONLINE
PERFORMANCES • • • — To be
released!
—
CANZONAS Trios,
Duos
and Solos Anna
Marsh
~ dulcian (renaissance bassoon)
John Lenti ~ theorbo
Jeffrey Cohan ~ renaissance flute
Yes,
still to come! ...an unusual and
extensive exploration of the
fabric of early 17th-century music
in Italy (mostly) through the
perspective of the
players of dulcian,
renaissance transverse flute, theorbo
and renaissance lute.
The
program includes a solo lute Fantasia
by Giovanni
Battista
Dalla Gostena (1540-1593),
a Canzona (1636) by Giovanni
Battista
Buonamente (c1595–1642), a
Sonata as well as Cantantibus
organis by Giovanni
Paolo Cima (c1570–1630)
from his Concerti Ecclesiastici
(Milan 1610), five wonderful
canzonas by Tarquinio
Merula (1594/5-1665) from
his Opus 12 (1637) and Opus 17
(1651), a Fantasia for
dulcian solo as well as divisions on
Vestiva e colli for flute
and dulcian, both published in 1638
by Bartolomé
de Selma y Salaverde
(~1595-1638), diminutions
byGirolamo
Dalla Casaon
Petit Jacquet after the
chanson by jean Courtois
for flute and lute, aSonata Concertante by Dario
Castello(1602-1631)
from 1631, and two duos for flute
and dulcian: Beaux yeux by
Jan
Pieterszoon Sweelinck
(1562-1621) and a setting of Le
rossignol plaisant & gratieux
by Didier
le blanc.
Fantasia
11 by Giovanni Bassano (1585)
January 11, 2021
Fantasia
3 (1585) by Giovanni Bassano
December 29, 2020
Please see
links in the left column above for specific dates
for each location. ~updated
January 11, 2026~ Suggested Donation for all
concerts:
$20 to $30
(a free will offering - everyone is most welcome)
• 18 and under FREE •
Do you receive our email announcements and flyers?!
Please sign our MAILING LIST (specify concert
location)
by sending your address and
any other comments to salishseafestival@aol.com
~ thank you!
SSEMF
banner: detail from "The Last Time it Reached
Zero" by James C. Holl. SSEMF presents outstanding early chamber music thanks to your support.
The
Salish
Sea Early Music Festival is proud to be
an affiliate organization of Early
Music America, which develops,
strengthens, and celebrates early music
and historically informed performance in
North America.
The
Salish Sea Early Music Festival is a
501(c)3 organization and all donations
are fully tax deductible in accordance
with the law. Your donations are
welcomed at
https://www.salishseafestival.org/donate
.
June
6-17, 2025: 
