Timeless works, boundless passion, superb artistry & high-energy concerts characterize
“One of Chicago’s musical glories.”
Opera News
One of the few groups of its stature in the country devoted to the performance of eighteenth-century works, Music of the Baroque is consistently positioned among Chicago’s leading classical music groups. Under the direction of internationally acclaimed British conductor Dame Jane Glover, Music of the Baroque has presented Chicago audiences with premier and revival presentations of early masterpieces, drawing particular praise for its performances of the major choral works of J. S. Bach and Handel.
An age of innovation and invention, the Baroque era sparked the creation of history’s great musical genres – opera concertos, cantatas, oratorios, and even the symphony. Join Music of the Baroque and Music Director Dame Jane Glover as well as the Music of the Baroque Chorus and Orchestra for their 2024-25 season, full of inspiration.
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HAYDN — THE CREATION
Sunday, September 15, 3pm
The creation of the world as told in the Book of Genesis springs to life through vivid musical pictures. Dame Jane Glover leads the Music of the Baroque Chorus, Orchestra, and internationally renowned opera stars Joélle Harvey, Aaron Sheehan, and Brandon Cedel in Haydn’s timeless work of boundless imagination and genius.
THE ELEMENTS
Sunday, October 27, 7:30pm
Laurence Cummings, music director of the Academy of Ancient Music, explores life’s basic building blocks—earth, air, fire, and water. The watery Neptune splashes through Rameau’s Suite from Naïs and Ebb und Fluth, Telemann’s own “Water Music.” Vivaldi leads the earthly charge in the “Autumn” Concerto from The Four Seasons. All the elements dance and twirl in Rebel’s shockingly imaginative Les Elémens.
THE CHRISTMAS ORATORIO
Sunday, November 24, 7:30pm
From the opening chorus’s joyful, exuberant trumpets and timpani, the Christmas story unfolds in dramatic narrative, moving arias, and stirring chorales. Dame Jane Glover brings together an impressive cast of soloists, including the return of Gwilym Bowen as the Evangelist, with the Chorus and Orchestra for this powerful and passionate work.
MINKOWSKI CONDUCTS
Sunday, January 26, 3:00pm
Renowned French conductor Marc Minkowski makes his Music of the Baroque debut with music by three orchestral gods—Handel, Rameau, and Mozart. Handel’s concerto grosso was originally the overture to a lost “magic opera.” The Greek god Apollo saves the day in Rameau’s Suite from Les Boréades. And the sheer power of Mozart’s Symphony No. 41—his final orchestral work—prompted the connection to Jupiter, the Roman god of the sky.
HANDEL’S THEODORA
Sunday, March 2, 7:30pm
In celebration of Principal Guest Conductor Nicholas Kraemer’s 80th birthday, a world-renowned cast of soloists—Sherezade Panthaki, Iestyn Davies, Allyson McHardy, David Portillo, and Jonathan Woody—joins the Chorus and Orchestra for one of Handel’s great dramatic masterpieces (and his own personal favorite): the story of the virtuous martyr Theodora and her Roman protector Didymus.
MOZART AND HIS MENTORS
Sunday, April 6, 7:30pm
Mozart learned a great deal from talented musicians around him. Dame Jane Glover explores symphonies by two of his most admired mentors—Josef Mysliveček and Johann Adolph Hasse. Imogen Cooper returns to Music of the Baroque for Mozart’s playful and virtuosic Piano Concerto No. 13.
