Salt Spring Baroque is pleased to present Anna Marsh (dulcian), Byron Schenkman (harpsichord), and Lindsey Strand-Polyak (violin) in Viva la Sonata.
Viva la Sonata is a celebration of the beginnings of the sonata featuring three instruments key to its development.
The early sonata, meaning “to sound”, is composed of short sections with different tempi that would later change into the extended multi-movement sonatas that we know from the later works of Beethoven, Mozart and others. In its early days, the sonata was very similar to the canzona (song), fantasia (fantasy) and toccata (touch) which are also highlighted in this concert.
The programme will include works by many lesser known baroque composers such as Fontana, Merula, Casulana, Frescobaldi, Rösenmüller, Uccellini, Jarzębski and Bertoli.
Saturday, April 15, 2023 7:00 pm
All Saints by-the-Sea Anglican Church
110 Park Drive, Salt Spring Island
Performer Bios
Anna Marsh http://annamarshmusic.com is a Baroque wind specialist, who is also fluent in Medieval, Renaissance, Classical and Modern instruments. Her interests lie principally in the double‐reed family, though she also performs on the Renaissance and Baroque recorder. Originally from Tacoma, WA, Anna appears regularly with Opera Lafayette (DC), Tempesta di Mare (Philadelphia), Ensemble Caprice (Montreal), Opera Atelier (Toronto), Tafelmusik (Toronto), Washington Bach Consort (DC), and Pacific MusicWorks (Seattle), among others. She has been the featured soloist with the Foundling Orchestra with Marion Verbruggen, Arion Orchestre Baroque, The Buxtehude Consort, The Dryden Ensemble, the Boulder Bach Festival, New York State Baroque, the Indiana University Baroque Orchestra and others. She co‐directs Ensemble Lipzodes and has taught both privately and at festivals and master classes at the Eastman School of Music, Los Angeles Music and Art School, the Amherst Early Music, and Hawaii Performing Arts Festivals and the Albuquerque, San Francisco Early Music Society, Rocky Ridge Music Center and Western Double Reed Workshop. She tours internationally, mostly to Europe and South America, and has also been heard on Performance Today, Harmonia and CBC radio and recorded for Chandos, Analekta, Centaur, Naxos, the Super Bowl, Avie, and Musica Omnia. Marsh studied music and German studies at Mt. Holyoke College, The Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California and holds a Doctor of Music from the Jacobs School of Music at Indiana University.
Byron Schenkman http://byronschenkman.com is a Queer Jewish keyboard player and scholar with a background in Historical Performance and a passion for connecting people through music. In addition to performing live on piano, harpsichord, and fortepiano, Byron can be heard on more than forty CDs, including recordings on historical instruments from the National Music Museum, Vermillion, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. They can also be heard in numerous online performances with Byron Schenkman & Friends and with the Portland Baroque Orchestra for which they served as Artistic Advisor for the 2021/2022 season. A founding director of the Seattle Baroque Orchestra, Byron received the Erwin Bodky Award from the Cambridge Society for Early Music “for outstanding achievement in the field of early music” and was voted “Best Classical Instrumentalist” by the readers of Seattle Weekly. Their playing has been described in The New York Times as “sparkling,” “elegant,” and “insightful.” In recent seasons Byron has been a featured artist at the Boston Early Music Festival and the Vancouver Bach Festival, and has premiered new works by Damien Geter and Jonathan Woody. Byron is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music and received a master’s degree with honors in performance from the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.
Lindsey Strand-Polyak https://www.strandpolyak.com/
A Pacific Northwest native, Lindsey Strand-Polyak lives a hyphenated life to go along with her hyphenated name: divided between viola and violin; living in Whidbey Island and Los Angeles. This season takes her across the West for concert and festival appearances with Baroque Music Montana, Bach Collegium San Diego, Musica Angelica, Sinfonia Spirituosa, Bitterroot Baroque, Baroque Festival Corona del Mar and the Oregon Bach Festival. She performs with Byron Schenkman & Friends, the Salish Sea Early Music Festival and as principal violist with Seattle Baroque Orchestra. She also serves on the boards of Early Music Seattle as the SBO liaison and Pacific Northwest Viols.
She is Artistic Director of Los Angeles Baroque, Adjunct Professor of Baroque Violin at Claremont Graduate University, and Guest Artistic Director of Kensington Baroque Orchestra. She has previously taught at the Colburn School and was Associate Director of the UCLA Early Music Ensemble from 2011-2015.
A few favorite pre-pandemic musical endeavors include: Artist residencies at Michigan State University, University of Richmond, Northwestern State University of Louisiana, and University of Northern Colorado; and memorable musicking moments performing with American Bach Soloists, Pacific MusicWorks, and in fringe concerts of Boston and Berkeley Early Music Festivals. In the non-baroque world, she has recorded for film and TV scores, and performed with artists across the musical spectrum from Anne Akiko Meyers to Stevie Wonder.
Dr. Strand-Polyak holds a PhD/MM in musicology and violin performance from UCLA, studying with Movses Pogossian, Guillaume Sutre and Elisabeth LeGuin.
Anna Marsh
Byron Schenkman
