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Music lovers of the Baroque period will be treated to a performance by Elizir Baroque Ensemble as part of the Guest Artist Series at the SUNY Fredonia School of Music on Thursday, Oct. 13, 8 p.m. at Rosch Recital Hall.
Through rarely performed masterpieces, the Toronto-based group takes audiences on a historical journey through Germany, Italy, France and England of the 17th and 18th centuries, featuring works by Biber, Handel, Purcell, Rameau and Castello. Their SUNY Fredonia performance is free and open to the public.
Elizer Baroque Ensemble is comprised of baroque violinist Elyssa Lefurgey-Smith, viola da gambist Justin Haynes and harpsichordist Sara-Anne Churchill.
Lefurgey-Smith has performed regularly with the Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, Opera Atelier, Talisker Players, Opera in Concert, Orchestra London and London Philharmonic. She has been invited as a guest artist with I Furiosi Baroque Ensemble and has been a soloist with the Corktown Chamber Orchestra, Georgetown Bach Chorale and Alicier Arts Concert series.
She is also a member of the Aradia Baroque Ensemble, in both orchestral and chamber music series, and has made six recordings with the group. Performances on the international stage have taken Lefurgey-Smith to Russia, Australia, France and Ireland; this summer she will be traveling with Aradia Ensemble to festivals in Newfoundland and Italy.
Lefurgey-Smith has taught and coached chamber music for more than a decade, serving on the faculty of summer music programs in British Columbia and Seattle, Wash., and several festivals in Ontario.
Churchill, a sought-after orchestral player, chamber musician and soloist, recently performed with the I Furiosi Ensemble, Aradia Ensemble, Orchestra London, Niagara Symphony, Mississauga Symphony and The Musicians in Ordinary and Capella Intima. She is one of the first graduates of the new Advanced Certificate in Performance-Baroque Option, offered jointly by the University of Toronto and Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra.
Haynes studied cello and viola da gamba at Harvard and the Royal Dutch Conservatory in the Hague where his principal teachers were Philippe Pierlot, Anneke Pols and Reiner Zipperling. Currently based in Toronto, he has performed with Folia, Scaramella, Tafelmusik and Opera Atelier, as well as with the Boston-based Arcturus Chamber Ensemble and Les Bostonades. Haynes is also a founding member of the newly formed baroque chamber ensemble, L'Indiscrete.
