Welcome to our August Newsletter!
Scroll to the bottom of this newsletter for information on our upcoming Labor Day sale!
Sarasa Ensemble’s 2022-23 Season begins soon!
“Window of the Soul”
Peer through the “Window of the Soul” with Sarasa, and experience a myriad number of musical personalities, such as Händel, Strozzi, Bembo, Beethoven, Brahms, Fanny Mendelssohn, Dvořák, Gershwin, and many more whose works offer inspiration and reflection during trying times.
“Female Torchbearers of the Baroque”
Prepare yourselves to be in awe at our opening concert!
Isabella Leonarda, Francesca Caccini, Barbara Strozzi, Antonia Bembo and Elisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre were among a number of outstanding female Baroque composers who lit the music world alight with their own compositions and performances. This program highlights some fantastic, yet neglected music by these women, who deservedly achieved a popular following usually reserved for their male counterparts. We retrace their lives and some incredible music that should be performed much more regularly!
Friday, September 16, 2022 Brattleboro Music Center, VT 7pm [tix: bmcvt.org]
Saturday, September 17, 2022 Harvard-Epworth United Methodist Church, Cambridge 7:30pm
Sunday, September 18, 2022 Follen Community Church, Lexington 3:30pm
PROGRAM:
Francesca Caccini Lasciatemi qui solo for soprano and lute Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre Sonata No. 2 in D major for violin, viol & basso continuo
Barbara Strozzi 'Che si può fare' from arie e voce sola, op.8 for soprano and basso continuo
Antonio Bertali Ciaconna in C major for violin and basso continuo
interval
Isabella Leonarda Sonata Duodecima for violin and basso continuo in D minor, op. 16
Elisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre Prelude from Suite No.1 in D minor Pièces de Clavecin 1er Livre
Antonia Padoani Bembo Cantata ‘Lamento della Vergine’ for soprano and continuo
With Kristen Watson, soprano; Elicia Silverstein, violin; Jennifer Morsches, piccolo cello; Timothy Merton, cello; Michael Leopold, Baroque lute/theorbo; John McKean, harpsichord
Sarasa is proud to celebrate some of the many neglected female Baroque composers in our opening concert of the 2022-23 season. The battle for women’s rights and complete equality are issues that have been have hard-fought for centuries!
The Parliament of Women Author unknown, London, 1646.
By permission of the British Library Board. Shelfmark: E.1150(5)
The Parliament of Women. With the merrie laws by them newly enacted to live in more ease, pomp, pride and wantonnesse: but especially that they might have superiority and domineer over their husbands: with a new way found out by them to cure any or new Cuckolds, and how both parties may recover their credit and honesty againe.
Famous Nuns in Music
We’ve heard of Hildegard of Bingen, we’ve heard of Sister Maria from “A Sound of Music.” Now we would like to introduce you to another nun with incredible musical skills, who has remained mostly ignored by both professional and student musicians, as well as scholars. Upon discovering and cataloguing her works, the 18th-century French music lover and collector, Sébastien de Brossard, wrote, "All the works of this illustrious and incomparable Isabella Leonarda are so beautiful, so gracious, so brilliant and at the same time so learned and so wise, that my great regret is not having them all.” During her many years at the convent Collegio di Sant’ Orsola in Novara, Italy, near Milan, the highly productive Leonarda wrote more than 200 works. She diverged from sacred vocal music to instrumental works at the age of 73, and is credited with being the first female composer to write violin sonatas with continuo. Here is the opening of her “Sonata duodecima” from her opus 16, which violinist Elicia Silverstein will be performing with us in September.
Isabella Leonarda (1620-1704) - Adagio from "Sonata duodecima" in D minor for violin and basso continuo
August means pickling time for many who keep vegetable gardens!
This jar of pickled peppers was inspired by Ukrainian chef, Olia Hercules. https://oliahercules.com
And for those of you with too many cucumbers, here is a great recipe for Refrigerator Pickles! YUMMY!
https://www.onceuponachef.com/recipes/quick-and-easy-dill-pickles.html
