Salt Spring Baroque is starting it's 2025 season with German soprano Dorothee Mields and Vancouver harpsichordist Alexander Weimann in "Love, Hope, and Heaven on Earth", a fascinating programme of beautiful songs on the deeply human subjects of life and love. The program opens with A Solis Ortus Cardine by Celius Sedulius (ca. 450) – a Gregorian chant where each verse begins with a consecutive letter of the Latin alphabet, making the poem an "abecedarius". The programme then moves into baroque works by composers of the late 16th and early 17th centuries – including two songs by Barbara Strozzi, said to be the most prolific composer – man or woman – of printed secular vocal music in Venice in the middle of the 17th century. Salt Spring's Clark Saunders will read texts and poetry that underscore the themes presented in the songs, including biblical texts, and poetry by Alfred Lord Tennyson, Pablo Neruda, Margaret Atwood and Billy Collins.
Wednesday, February 12, 2025 7:00 pm
Salt Spring United Church, 111 Hereford Ave
Tickets can be purchased online through Salt Spring Baroque's TIX site by clicking on the blue button below, or online through the ArtSpring box office by clicking on the red button. Tickets are also available in person at the ArtSpring box office, or at the door the night of the performance.
Note: to purchase tickets on the Salt Spring Baroque's TIX site, click on the blue button above which will take you to the TIX website. Once on the TIX website, click the green button to select your tickets – prior to checking out you will need to set up a TIX account prior to checking out. This can be done by clicking on the person icon in the top right next to the shopping cart. If you have purchased tickets from TIX before you will already have an account.
If you don't wish to purchase tickets online, send us a note at info@saltspringbaroque.com and we will gladly reserve seats for you and you can pay by cash or card at the door.
PERFORMER BIOS
DOROTHEE MIELDS
Dorothee Mields is one of the leading interpreters of 17th- and 18th-century music and is beloved by audiences and critics alike for her unique timbre and moving interpretations.
She appears regularly with the Collegium Vocale Gent, Netherlands Bach Society, L'Orfeo Barockorchester, Freiburger Barockorchester, RIAS Kammerchor, Bach Collegium Japan, Orchestra of the 18th Century, Lautten Compagney Berlin, Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra Toronto, The English Concert and Klangforum Wien under conductors such as Stefan Asbury, Beat Furrer, Michi Gaigg, Paul Goodwin, Philippe Herreweghe, Emilio Pomàrico, Hans-Christoph Rademann, Andreas Spering, Masaaki Suzuki and Jos van Veldhoven.
Dorothee is a welcome guest at international festivals, including the Leipzig Bach Festival, Suntory Music Foundation Summer Festival in Japan, Boston Early Music Festival, Flanders Festival, Wiener Festwochen, the Handel Festival in Halle, Musikfestspiele Potsdam, Styriarte Graz, Niedersächsische Musiktage, Musikfest Bremen, Mainzer Musiksommer and Mosel Musikfest.
She is a devoted chamber musician and offers a range of highly interesting projects such as "Lord Nelson at the river Nile" (music by Haydn and contemporaries dealing with the battles of Lord Nelson), "White as Lillies was her Face" with songs by John Dowland combined with texts by Heinrich Heine, "Mort exquise, mort parfumée" with French impressionistic compositions, "Duft und Wahnsinn" (fragrance and lunacy) together with Hille Perl, viola da gamba, and Lee Santana, lute, as well as "Birds" with flutist Stefan Temmingh.
A steadily growing discography with several award-winning recordings documents her artistic achievements. "Inspired by Song" and "Birds" with Stefan Temmingh, "Handel" with Hille Perl, Monteverdi "La dolce vita" with the Lautten Compagney Berlin and Wolfgang Katschner (all DHM), Bach "Kantaten für Solo-Sopran" with L'Orfeo Barockorchester and Michi Gaigg and Boccherini Stabat mater with the Salagon Quartett (both Carus) have been especially well received.
ALEXANDER WEIMANN
Alexander Weimann is one of the most sought-after ensemble directors, soloists, and chamber music partners of his generation. After traveling the world with ensembles like Tragicomedia, Cantus Cölln, the Freiburger Barockorchester, the Gesualdo Consort and Tafelmusik.
Recently, he has conducted the Montreal-based baroque orchestra Ensemble Arion, Les Violons du Roy, and the Portland Baroque Orchestra; both the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra have regularly featured him as a featured soloist. In the last years, he has repeatedly conducted the Victoria Symphony and Symphony Nova Scotia, most recently with Handel's "Messiah".
Alexander can be heard on some 100 CDs. He made his North American recording debut with the ensemble Tragicomedia on the CD Capritio (Harmonia Mundi USA), and won worldwide acclaim from both the public and critics for his 2001 release of Handel's Gloria (ATMA Classique). Volume 1 of his recordings of the complete keyboard works by Alessandro Scarlatti appeared in May 2005. Critics around the world unanimously praised it, and in the following year it was nominated for an Opus Prize as the best Canadian early music recording. Recently, he has also released an Opus Award-winning CD of Handel oratorio arias with superstar soprano Karina Gauvin and his new Montreal-based ensemble Tempo Rubato, a recording of Bach's St. John's Passion, various albums with Les Voix Baroques of Buxtehude, Carissimi and Purcell, all with rave reviews. His latest album with Karina Gauvin and Arion Baroque Orchestra (Prima Donna) won a Juno Award in 2013, and a complete recording of Handel's Orlando was released in the fall of 2013, with an exciting group of international star soloists and the Pacific Baroque Orchestra performing.
Mr. Weimann was born in 1965 in Munich, where he studied the organ, church music, musicology (with a summa cum laude thesis on Bach's secco recitatives), theatre, medieval Latin, and jazz piano, supported by a variety of federal scholarships for the highly talented. In addition to his studies, he has attended numerous master classes in harpsichord and historical performance. To ground himself further in the roots of western music, he became intensely involved over the course of several years with Gregorian chant.
He is Artistic Director of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra in Vancouver and teaches at the University of British Columbia where he directs the Baroque Orchestra Mentorship Programme.
PROGRAMME
Celius Sedulius | d. ca 450 A Solis Ortus Cardine
Barbara Strozzi | 1619-1677 Surgite, surgite from Sacri Musicali Affetti op. 5.10
Harpsichord solo tba
Giovanni Felice Sances | 1600-1679 Stabat mater
Claudio Monteverdi | 1567-1643 Pianto della Proserpina
Harpsichord solo tba
Giulio Caccini | 1550-1618
Dolcissimo Sospiro
Amarilli mia bella
Torna deh torna
Barbara Strozzi | 1619-1677 L'Eraclito amoroso, Cantata op. 2.14
The programme is approximately 65 minutes in length, and will be performed without an intermission.
Dorothee Mields, soprano
Alexander Weimann, harpsichord
Clark Saunders, readings