Cleveland Lute Fest 2026 – Faculty Biographies for lute and voice instruction and concerts

Brandon Acker

Brandon Acker is a musician, educator, and content creator well known for his artistry and passion for music. Specializing in classical guitar and historical plucked instruments, Brandon has captivated audiences worldwide with his dynamic performances and insightful teaching on YouTube with a following of over 620,000 subscribers and has had 60 million total views on YouTube. As an educator he founded an online music school called Arpeggiato and created engaging online courses for classical guitar with over 2000 students enrolled. Brandon’s performance career started with playing electric guitar in rock bands, and now he performs on early plucked instruments from the baroque and classical periods. He has toured extensively through the United States, England, Canada, Scotland and Wales, and performed with notable groups such as Apollo’s Fire, the Handel and Hadyn Society, the Breathtaking Collective with Bruce Dickey, the Joffrey Ballet, the New berry Consort, and the Haymarket Opera Company. He can be heard on his CDs such as: A Wanderer’s Guitar, Schubert lieder arranged for guitar and baritone, Corelli, Op.5 Violin Sonatas with violinist Rachel Barton Pine; and Strung Up, minimalist music arranged for harp and guitar.

Robert Barto

Robert Barto taught himself the lute while studying at the University of California in San Diego. After continuing his studies with Michael Schaeffer in Cologne and Eugen Dombois at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis in Basel, Switzerland, he was awarded first prize in the International Lute Competition in Toronto (1984) and top prize of all instrumental soloists in the Musica Antiqua Competition in Bruges, Belgium.

One of today’s leading lutenists, his baroque lute recordings on Naxos of the music of Sylvius Weiss have met with critical acclaim and sold hundreds of thousands of copies. His recording of Weiss’s lute duets with the late Karl-Ernst Schroeder was called “lute CD of the decade” by Early Music magazine. Mr. Barto has performed in London’s Purcell Room, the Utrecht Festival, and in New York City’s Music Before 1800 series. Robert Barto has been invited to share the stage by musicians as varied as Leo Kottke and John Williams.

Joanna Blendulf

Joanna Blendulf is professor of music in baroque cello/viola da gamba at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music.

Blendulf has performed and recorded with leading period-instrument ensembles throughout the United States and abroad. She is currently co-principal cellist and principal viola da gamba player of the Portland Baroque Orchestra. She has also performed as principal cellist of Pacific MusicWorks, Pacific Baroque Orchestra, American Bach Soloists, Indianapolis Baroque Orchestra, Apollo’s Fire Baroque Orchestra, and the New York Collegium. She was a principal cellist of the New World Symphony under Michael Tilson Thomas and has performed with other modern orchestras, including the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra and the Nashville Chamber Orchestra.

Blendulf is an avid chamber musician, performing regularly on major concert series and appearing on numerous recordings with her groups, including the Ensemble Electra, Ensemble Mirable, Music of the Spheres, Nota Bene Viol Consort, and Wildcat Viols. She appears as a frequent guest viol player with the Catacoustic Consort and Parthenia, and has collaborated with acclaimed artists such as Monica Huggett, Stephen Stubbs, Matthias Maute, Bruce Dickey, and Joan Jeanrenaud. Blendulf’s world-premiere recording of the complete cello sonatas of Jean Zewalt Triemer with Ensemble Mirable was released in 2004.

Blendulf’s festival engagements have included performances at Tage Alter Musik Regenburg, Musica Antigua en Villa de Leyva in Colombia, the Bloomington, Boston, and Berkeley early music festivals, and the Ojai Music Festival, as well as the Carmel and Oregon Bach Festivals. She is also sought after as a teacher and chamber music coach and has served as a classroom and private instructor at the University of Oregon and the Berwick Academy. As an active member of the Viola da gamba Society of America, she teaches regularly at viol workshops such as the annual Conclave, Viols West, and Young Players Weekend, and has served as a national Circuit Rider teacher.

She holds performance degrees with honors from the Cleveland Institute of Music and the Jacobs School of Music, where she earned a Performer’s Certificate for her accomplishments in early music performance.

David Brown

David Brown, based in Baltimore, MD, began building instruments in 1976 including his first lute in 1978. His ongoing work includes a range of instrument building, restoration, repair and adjustment of lutes, early guitars, early harps, ouds, mandolins, violas da gamba, vintage guitars, and more. (Participation in the building of a Northern German baroque-style tracker organ gave him enough experience to keep him limited to smaller instruments!)

He has traveled to study, measure, photograph instruments in museums and private collections in the U.S., Europe and Taiwan. The stringing of the 16th-century Este harp presented an unusual chance to work with a primary source. Work in the Chimei Museum (Tainan, Taiwan) brought an opportunity to advise on the Western early music instrument display, which included referencing the catalogue with the instruments in the depository of the non-violin family collection. This yielded the discovery of a multi-rib ebony lute body that had been converted into a mandola in 1750. In addition, he was consulted for the ordering of strings for the entire baroque setup violin subset of the extensive violin family collection.

Mr. Brown has presented talks at various seminars and has on multiple occasions taught the instrument-making part of a music history class at Peabody Conservatory, and in the Johns Hopkins University mechanical engineering department.

Eduardo Egüez

Born in Buenos Aires, Eduardo Egüez studied classical guitar with Miguel Ángel Girollet and Eduardo Fernández, and composition at the Catholic University of Argentina. In 1995, he obtained a diploma in lute from the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, where he studied with Hopkinson Smith.

He has appeared as a soloist in major cities throughout the Americas, Europe, Australia, Turkey, and Japan, receiving critical acclaim and wide public recognition.

He has won prizes at international competitions, including Promociones Musicales (Buenos Aires, 1984), Círculo Guitarrístico Argentino (Buenos Aires, 1984), the Concours International de Guitare (Paris, Radio France, 1986), and the V Concurso Internacional de Guitarra (Fundación Jacinto e Inocencio Guerrero, Madrid, 1989).

Eduardo Egüez is currently Professor of Lute and Basso Continuo at the Zurich University of the Arts (ZHdK), Switzerland. He has taught lute and guitar in courses, seminars, and masterclasses at numerous institutions across Europe, Asia, and the Americas.

As a soloist, he has recorded Tombeau (works by Silvius Leopold Weiss) for E Lucevan le Stelle. For MA Recordings, he recorded the complete lute works of Johann Sebastian Bach, Le Maître du Roy (dedicated to Robert de Visée), and L’Infidèle, awarded a Diapason d’Or in 2010.

In 2024, Glossa released O felici occhi miei, devoted to Renaissance lute music by Northern Italian composers.
Eduardo Egüez has conducted stage productions including La púrpura de la rosa by Torrejón y Velasco (Festspiele Sanssouci, Potsdam),L’Orfeo by Claudio Monteverdi (Chile), and Gli Intermedi della Pellegrina at the Innsbrucker Festwochen and the Tage Alter Musik Festival in Regensburg.

Since 2005, Eduardo Egüez has directed the ensemble La Chimera, dedicated to interdisciplinary projects combining music with literature, dance, and visual arts, and to the dialogue between early and contemporary repertoires. With La Chimera, he has recorded critically acclaimed albums including Buenos Aires Madrigal, Tonos y Tonadas, La Voce di Orfeo (Naïve, 2009), Odisea Negra (Naïve, 2011), Misa de Indios (La Música, 2014), Gracias a la Vida (La Música, 2018), Fuga y Misterio (La Música, 2020), Lachrimae & Songs, and Iguazú (2021).

La Chimera has performed in major venues such as the Salle Gaveau and Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord (Paris), the Philharmonic Hall of Liège, Lille Opera, Palacio Euskalduna (Bilbao), Teatro Ponchielli (Cremona), Radio France’s Salle Olivier Messiaen, the Sydney Recital Hall, and the Concertgebouw in Bruges, as well as at leading international festivals including Innsbrucker Festwochen, Oude Muziek Utrecht, La Chaise-Dieu, Lanvellec, Noirlac, Via Aeterna, and Semana Santa de Bilbao.

Since 1992, he has been active as a continuo player with leading early music ensembles, including Elyma (Gabriel Garrido), Hespèrion XXI (Jordi Savall), Orchestra Mozart (Claudio Abbado), Ensemble Baroque de Limoges (Christophe Coin), La Grande Écurie et la Chambre du Roy (Jean-Claude Malgoire), Concerto Italiano (Rinaldo Alessandrini), Les Talents Lyriques (Christophe Rousset), The Rare Fruits Council (Manfred Kraemer), Cappella Gabetta (Andrés Gabetta), Balthasar Neumann Orchestra (Thomas Hengelbrock), among others.
He has collaborated with distinguished artists such as Emma Kirkby, María Cristina Kiehr, Rolf Lislevand, Furio Zanasi, and Zachary Wilder.

His extensive discography includes recordings for major labels such as Astrée (Auvidis/Naïve), Arcana, Glossa, K617, Opus 111, Alia Vox, Stradivarius, Alpha, Ambroisie, Naxos, Mirare, Harmonia Mundi, Sony, and Decca.

In 2025, he presented Renaissance lute recital programmes O felici occhi miei and Cabinet der Lauten, devoted to 17th-century French lute repertoire. He also led international early music courses in Cuenca and Morella (Spain) and taught at the Oficina de Música in Curitiba, Brazil.

Eduardo Egüez’s Website: eduardoeguez.com

Lucas Harris

Lucas Harris leads a busy freelancer’s life as a lutenist, conductor, continuo player, teacher, lecturer, coach, and researcher. His collection of over twenty plucked-string instruments includes various Renaissance & Baroque lutes/guitars as well as a theorbo, cittern, bandora, an 1831 Guadagnini guitar, an 18th-century English guittar, and a PRS electric guitar with a Floyd-Rose tremolo bar.

Lucas discovered the lute during his undergraduate studies at Pomona College, where he graduated summa cum laude. He then studied early music at the Civica scuola di musica di Milano and at the Hochschule für Künste Bremen before beginning his freelancing career in New York City. For the past two decades he bases his activities in Toronto, where he serves as the regular lutenist for Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra. He is a founding member of the Toronto Continuo Collective, the Vesuvius Ensemble (dedicated to Southern Italian folk music), as well as the Lute Legends Collective (an association of specialists in ancient plucked string traditions from different cultures). Lucas plays with many ensembles in Canada and the USA and has worked in recent years with the Helicon Foundation, the Smithsonian Chamber Players, The Newberry Consort, Les Délices, and Jordi Savall / Le Concert des Nations. He is also a regular guest artist for Early Music Vancouver, and will be assistant director for EMV’s production of Monteverdi’s Orfeo in 2026 in addition to developing an EMV concert featuring Dowland’s Lachrymae alongside songs about the therapeutic power of music. Lucas teaches graduate students at the University of Toronto and Case Western Reserve University, and is also on faculty at several workshops including the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institutes, Oberlin Conservatory’s Baroque Performance Institute, and the Canadian Renaissance Music Summer School. Also a choral conductor, Lucas has been the Artistic Director of the Toronto Chamber Choir since 2014 and has developed and conducted over thirty themed concert programs for the TCC. He has also been a guest director for the Pacific Baroque Orchestra, the Ohio State University Opera Program, Les voix baroques, Atalante, and the Toronto Consort. Lucas’s longstanding interest in women composers has resulted in many projects including the reconstruction of 12 solo-voice motets by Chiara Margarita Cozzolani (the edition is now available for free download at the Web Library for Seventeenth-Century Music).

Lucas Harris’ Website: lucasharris.ca

Danur Kvilhaug

Danur Kvilhaug is active as a lutenist and vocalist, performing regularly throughout North America. Recent engagements include performances with the Newberry Consort, Les Delices, Bourbon Baroque, Tonos del Sur, and the Bloomington Symphony Orchestra. Additionally, he has performed at the Madison Early Music Festival, the Bloomington Early Music Festival, and with the Red River Lyric Opera. In addition to performing, he has held several teaching appointments, teaching courses in music history and music theory at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music and The University of Oklahoma. He received his MM in Musicology from The University of Oklahoma, as well as an MM and Performance Diploma in historical performance at Indiana University under the tutelage of Nigel North. He is currently a student of Charles Weaver.

Nigel North

Born in London, England, Nigel North has been playing the lute for over 50 years, since the age of 15. Teaching and playing have gone hand in hand and he has been Professor of Lute at the Historical Performance Institute (formerly Early Music Institute), Indiana University, Bloomington (USA) 1999 -2024. From July 2024 he was thrilled to return to Europe, and now lives in Gent, Belgium Previous positions include The Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London (1976–1995), Hochschule der Künste, Berlin (1993– 1999) and the Royal Conservatory, Den Haag, (2006–2009).

Initially inspired at the age of seven by the early 60’s instrumental pop group The Shadows, Nigel North studied classical music through the violin and guitar and eventually discovered his real path in life, the lute. Nigel is basically self-taught on the lute and was inspired by Michael Schäffer, Gustav Leonhardt and the Jazz duo, Tuck and Patti. The music of Bach has always been his first love in music, especially after a dream at age 12 in which Bach handed him a lute. After hearing one of Nigel’s Bach recitals in London, Julian Bream recalled in 2002 “I remember going to a remarkable recital, one which I wish I had the ability to give: it was one of Nigel North’s Bach recitals, and I was bowled over by how masterful and how musical it was. A real musical experience, something you don’t always get from guitar and lute players and which, in general, is pretty rare.”

Nigel North wrote Continuo playing on the Lute, Archlute and Theorbo (Faber, 1986 and Indiana University Press). More recently in 2024, Le Luth Dore (Paris) published Bach on the Lute, volumes 1 and 2. Transcriptions for baroque lute of BWV 1001-1006, 1007-1012 and the complete works for lute, BWV 999- 1006a. 2026 will see his latest book, Playing with Patterns: 16th century divisions on the lute (Oxford University Press) and a new edition of the complete lute works of John Dowland, Le Luth Dore (Paris).

Recordings include a four CD boxed set Bach on the Lute (Linn Records), four CDs of the lute music of John Dowland (Naxos), four CDs of music by Sylvius Weiss (BGS) and 2 CDs of music by Francesco da Milano (BGS). Most recently for “Deux-Elles” a double CD of Bach’s Complete works for lute and other new transcriptions (April 2023).

Nigel North’s Website: nigelnorth.com

Paul O’Dette

…should I come to meet Saint Peter at the pearly gates, I hope he will say, “Welcome, good and faithful servant! By the way, be sure to hear Paul O’Dette—he’s leading the angel band.” (Early Music America, Spring 2011).

Paul O’Dette has been described as “the clearest case of genius ever to touch his instrument.” (Toronto Globe and Mail). One of the most influential figures in his field, O’Dette has helped define the technical and stylistic standards to which twenty-first-century performers of early music aspire. In doing so, he helped infuse the performance practice movement with a perfect combination of historical awareness, idiomatic accuracy, and ambitious self-expression. His performances at the major international festivals in Boston, Vienna, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Munich, Prague, Milan, Florence, Geneva, Madrid, Barcelona, Tokyo, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Buenos Aires, Montevideo, Melbourne, Adelaide, Los Angeles, Vancouver, Berkeley, Bath, Montpellier, Utrecht, Bruges, Antwerp, Bremen, Dresden, Innsbruck, Tenerife, Copenhagen, Oslo, Cordoba, etc. have often been singled out as the highlight of those events.

Paul O’Dette has made more than 145 recordings, winning two Grammys, receiving eight Grammy nominations and numerous other international record awards. “The Complete Lute Music of John Dowland” (a 5-CD set for harmonia mundi usa), was awarded the prestigious Diapason D’or de l’année and selected as the “Best Solo Lute Recording of Dowland” by BBC Radio 3. “The Bachelar’s Delight: Lute Music of Daniel Bacheler” was nominated for a Grammy as “Best Solo Instrumental Recording of 2006.”

O’Dette is also active conducting Baroque operas. His recording of Charpentier’s La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers with Stephen Stubbs and the Boston Early Music Festival Chamber Ensemble won a Grammy for Best Opera Recording of 2014, as well as an Echo Klassik Award in the same category. In 1997 he directed performances of Luigi Rossi’s L’Orfeo at Tanglewood, the Boston Early Music Festival and the Drottningholm Court Theatre in Sweden with Stephen Stubbs. Since 1999 they have co-directed performances of Cavalli’s Ercole Amante at the Boston Early Music Festival, Tanglewood, and the Utrecht Early Music Festival, Provenzale’s La Stellidaura Vendicata at the Vadstena Academy in Sweden, Monteverdi’s Orfeo and L’Incoronazione di Poppea for Festival Vancouver, Lully’s Thésée, Conradi’s Ariadne (Hamburg, 1691) Mattheson’s Boris Goudenow, Lully’s Psyché, Monteverdi’s Poppea, Handel’s Acis and Galatea, Steffani’s Niobe, Handel’s Almira, Campra’s Le Carnaval de Venise, Pergolesi’s La Serva Padrona and Livietta e Tracollo for the Boston Early Music Festival. Six of their opera recordings have been nominated for Grammy awards, including Ariadne as Best Opera Recording of 2005, Thésée in 2007, Psyché in 2008, La Descente d’Orphée aux Enfers in 2014, Niobe in 2015 and Charpentier’s Les Arts Florissants in 2019. Their recording of Agostino Steffani’s Niobe, was awarded a Diapason D’or de l’année, an Echo Klassik Award and the prestigious Jahrespreis der Deutschenschallplattenkritik. Paul O’Dette has guest directed numerous Baroque orchestras and opera productions on both sides of the Atlantic.

In addition to his activities as a performer, Paul O’Dette is an avid researcher, having worked extensively on the performance and sources of seventeenth-century Italian and English solo song, continuo practices and lute music. He has published numerous articles on issues of historical performance practice and co-authored the Dowland entry in the New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians.

Paul O’Dette is Professor of Lute and Director of Early Music at the Eastman School of Music and Artistic Co-Director of the Boston Early Music Festival.

Jason Priset

Dr. Jason Priset is a professional guitarist and lutenist who performs around the world and has years of teaching experience in university classrooms and privately. He holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts from Stony Brook University in guitar performance and has studied, post-graduate, at one of Europe’s most prestigious conservatories: Escola Superior de Musica de Universitat de Catalunya in Barcelona, Spain.

Priset specializes in a variety of styles on instruments from the guitar and lute families —including the theorbo, renaissance lute, baroque guitar, 19th century guitar and modern guitars (electric and acoustic) . He has appeared in operas (including Florida Grand Opera, Loft Opera and the Riverside Symphony); early music ensembles (Early Music New York, Long Island Baroque Ensemble and Piffaro: The Renaissance Band); and musical venues such as Lincoln Center’s Alice Tully Hall, St. John the Divine in New York City and Museo de la Musica in Barcelona.
Priset teaches privately and is on the faculties of both Montclair State University and the Amherst Early Music Festival. He also directs the world’s premiere lute festival, the Lute Society of America’s annual festival.

Priset teaches privately and is on the faculties of both Montclair State University and the Amherst Early Music Festival. He also directs the world’s premiere lute festival, the Lute Society of America’s annual festival.

Jason Priset’s Website: jasonpriset.com

Mark Rimple

Mark Rimple is a composer and multi-instrumentalist whose musical interests span many centuries. He began his career as a classical guitarist, focusing on modernist works. In the decades that followed, he has recorded medieval music as lutenist (and often as countertenor) with Trefoil, The Newberry Consort, and New York’s Ensemble for Early Music, Renaissance music with Seven Times Salt, and new music with Network for New Music and Cygnus Ensemble. He has appeared many times with The Newberry Consort, The Folger Consort, and Piffaro, and has guested with Les Délices/Blue Heron, Hesperus, Ex Umbris, Nota Bene Viol Consort, and Mélomanie, among others. Most recently, he has recorded two solo anthologies for lute and guitar including Tre Liuti and Resonance.

As a scholar, he has published articles on the impact on music and the liberal arts of the late Roman polymath Boethius and has a particular interest in the intersection between Medieval and Renaissance literature, poetry, and theories of music. As a composer, he weds his interest in early music with a modern aesthetic. He has composed music for Network for New Music, counter)induction, ChoralArts Philadelphia, Mélomanie, and The League/ISCM Chamber Players. His chamber music and art songs frequently include harpsichord, archlute, viol, and countertenor, some of which can be heard on his recording January (New Focus). He has taught early music topics at workshops including the LSA Cleveland Lute Fest, the Amherst Early Music Festival, the Capitol Early Music workshop, the Madison Early Music Festival, The Shenandoah Early Music Festival.

Mark has taught at the Wells School of Music of West Chester University of Pennsylvania for over 25 years, where he holds the rank of Professor of Music Theory, History and Composition. He is a member of the board of directors and currently serves as President of the Lute Society of America. Before this, he was President of his campus chapter of the Association of Professors of State Colleges and Universities for six years and led his colleagues through that union’s first (successful) strike.

Mark Rimple’s Website: markrimple.wixsite.com

Laudon Schuett

Laudon Schuett is a Renaissance lutenist and early music specialist. He has been called “a masterful performer …[and] a brilliant educator” (Classical Voice of North Carolina) with “immaculate articulation and sensitive phrasing” (Fanfare). In 2022, Laudon released a solo album of original compositions for the lute called Dedications: New Works for the Lute on the Navona (PARMA) label. He published a book of 30 original compositions for lute called The Art of Lute Playing with Mel Bay (2022). In 2023, Laudon recorded a lute song by Branford Marsalis for the movie soundtrack to the film “Rustin,” a biopic on the life of the famous civil rights leader, Bayard Rustin. A public workshopping of his opera, Icarus, which combines the classic story of Icarus and Daedalus with a modern family struggling with the ravages of schizophrenia, will occur in the fall of 2026. In addition to performing and expanding the solo repertoire, he formed the lute song duo BEDLAM with Kayleen Sánchez in 2013. They have since toured the country and recorded three albums, BEDLAM, Died for Love, and a Christmas album called a joiful yule, which was released in November 2025. A dedicated educator, Laudon has also created a free Youtube series to help support students learning the lute, called “The Fundamentals of Lute Playing.” Laudon has been a guest instructor for Amherst Early Music and for the Lute Society of America. He has also been a guest lecturer and performer at numerous colleges and universities, including Cornell University, Arizona State University, Baylor University, Wheaton College, University of Kentucky, and Johns Hopkins University. He studied with Paul O’Dette, Frank Koonce, and Chuck Hulihan. He holds a BM in guitar performance from Arizona State University and an MM and DMA in Early Music from the Eastman School of Music.

Laudon Schuett’s Website: bedlamearlymusic.com

Hopkinson Smith

Born in New York in 1946, Swiss-American lutenist Hopkinson Smith graduated from Harvard with Honors in Music in 1972. His instrumental studies took him to Europe where he worked with Emilio Pujol, a great pedagogue in the highest Catalan artistic tradition, and with the Swiss lutenist, Eugen Dombois, whose sense of organic unity between performer, instrument, and historical period has had lasting effects on him. He has been involved in numerous chamber music projects and was one of the founding members of the ensemble Hespèrion XX. Since the mid-80’s, he has focused almost exclusively on the solo repertoires for early plucked instruments, producing a series of prize-winning recordings for Astrée and Naïve, which feature Spanish music for vihuela and baroque guitar, French lute music of the Renaissance and baroque, English and Italian music of the 16th early 17th century and music from the German high baroque.

The recording of his lute arrangements of the Bach solo violin Sonatas and Partitas, released in the year 2000, has been universally acclaimed by the press. Gramophone magazine called it “the best recording of these works on any instrument”. A Dowland recording, released in early 2005, won a Diapason d’Or and was called ‘wonderfully personal’ in a review in the New York Times. A recording with music from the world of Francesco da Milano, was awarded a Diapason d’Or de l’Année in November 2009 and has been called “the first recording to do justice to Francesco’s reputation.” A CD with the first three Bach Cello Suites played on the German Theorbo was released in early 2013, has also won a Diapason d’Or and was called “totally riveting” in the BBC Music Magazine. His recording, “Mad Dog,” devoted to highlights of the Golden Age of English lute music, also won a Diapason d’Or and has been called “mesmerizing” by the BBC. His most recent recording, “Bright and Early”, is devoted to the very first sources of Italian music for the Renaissance lute with works by Spinacino and Dalza.

Hopkinson Smith has performed and given master classes throughout Eastern and Western Europe, North and South America, Australia, New Zealand, Korea and Japan sometimes combining the life-style of a hermit with that of a gypsy. In 2007 and 2009, he gave concerts and workshops in Palestine under the auspices of the Barenboim-Said Foundation and the Swiss Arts Council. In 2010, he received the music prize from the Italian Region of Puglia with the inscription “maestro dei maestri, massimo interprete delle musiche per liuto dell’antica Europa Mediterranea”; he is the 2015 winner of the Music Prize from the city of Petrer in the province of Alicante in Spain and the 2018 he was honored by the International Festival of Taxco in Mexico. In October 2021 he received the Chitarra d’Oro award from the Convegno Internazionale de la Chitarra in Milan. He lives in Basel, Switzerland where he teaches at the Institute for Advanced Studies of the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis.

Hopkinson Smith’s Website: hopkinsonsmith.com

Estelí Gomez

Praised for her “clear, bright voice” (New York Times) and “artistry that belies her young years” (Kansas City Metropolis), soprano Estelí Gomez is quickly gaining recognition as a stylish interpreter of early and contemporary repertoires. In January 2014 she was awarded a GRAMMY with contemporary octet Roomful of Teeth, for best chamber music/small ensemble performance; in November 2011 she received first prize in the Canticum Gaudium International Early Music Vocal Competition in Poznan, Poland. Estelí can be heard on the soundtrack of Lena Dunham’s 2022 film Catherine, Called Birdy, Seattle Symphony’s 2017 recording of Nielsen’s Symphony No. 3, on the first track of Silkroad Ensemble’s Grammy-winning 2016 album Sing Me Home, and on Roomful of Teeth’s self-titled debut album, for which composer Caroline Shaw’s Partita was awarded the 2013 Pulitzer Prize.

Highlights of the season include recording a Spanish translation of Handel’s Messiah with Bach Collegium San Diego; the world premiere of chamber opera Dreams Have No Borders in Ashland, OR; solo appearances with Orchestra Iowa, Madison Bach Musicians, Spire Chamber Ensemble, Sheboygan Symphony, and the Early Music Latin America Festival in El Paso TX; performances at the Washington National Cathedral, Cathedral Church of the Advent Birmingham, and Epiphany Parish of Seattle; artist residencies at Avaloch Farms, University of Oregon Eugene, and UNC Greensboro; and concerts at the Barbican and Baryshnikov Arts Center, with additional tours throughout Europe, with Roomful of Teeth. Roomful’s third studio album, Rough Magic, received two GRAMMY nominations for 2024.

Estelí teaches at Lawrence University as assistant professor of voice, in addition to continuing her work as a performer. Originally from Watsonville, California, Estelí received her Bachelor of Arts with honors in music from Yale College, and Master of Music from McGill University, studying with Sanford Sylvan. She is also a proud member of Beyond Artists, a coalition of artists who donate a percentage of their concert fees to organizations they care about. She is currently donating to RAICES and the Texas Civil Rights Project.

​Estelí Gomez’s Website: esteligomez.com

Drew Minter

Regarded for over four decades as one of the world’s finest countertenors, Drew Minter grew up as a boy treble in the Washington Cathedral Choir of Men and Boys. He continued his education at Indiana University and the Musik Hochschule of Vienna. Minter appeared in leading roles with the opera companies of Brussels, Toulouse, Boston, Washington, Santa Fe, Wolf Trap, Glimmerglass, and Nice, among others. A recognized specialist in the works of Handel, he performed frequently at the Handel festivals of Göttingen, Halle, Karlsruhe, and Maryland. He sang with many of the world’s leading baroque orchestras, including Les Arts Florissants, the Handel and Haydn Society, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Freiburger Barockorchester, and as a guest at festivals such as Tanglewood, Ravinia, Regensburg, BAM’s Next Wave, Edinburgh, Spoleto, and Boston Early Music. Drew was a founding member of the Newberry Consort, as well as TREFOIL and My Lord Chamberlain’s Consort, and made over 70 recordings. He appears in two films: as Tolomeo in Peter Sellars’s Giulio Cesare, and as the Devil in In the Symphony of the World; a Portrait of Hildegard of Bingen. He writes regularly for Opera News.

Drew is also a lauded stage director. He began as director of the period production operas at the Göttingen Händel Festival for five years. Since then he has directed productions in many styles for the Opéra de Marseilles, Caramoor, the Boston Early Music Festival, Lake George Opera, the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Handel and Haydn Society, Indianapolis Opera, Boston’s Opera Aperta, the Manhattan School of Music, Mannes School of Music, Boston University’s Opera Institute, Amherst Early Music, the Folger Shakespeare Theatre, the Five Colleges in Northampton, Tempesta di Mare and Cleveland’s Apollo’s Fire. Drew was founding artistic director of Boston Midsummer Opera, which he headed for its first five seasons from 2006-2011.

In addition to numerous workshops in the vocal and dramatic performance of baroque music, Drew teaches voice at Vassar College, where he also directs the Vassar Opera Workshop and conducts the Vassar Chamber Singers. He has taught and directed opera since 1989 at the Amherst Early Music Institute.

Drew is a certified Feldenkrais practitioner and teaches Feldenkrais both at Vassar and in his local community.

Nell Snaidas

American-Uruguayan, GRAMMY-nominated soprano Nell Snaidas has been praised by the New York Times for her “beautiful soprano voice, melting passion” and “vocally ravishing” performances. Thanks to mentors Paul C. Echols and Nico Castel, Nell fell in love with Early Music and Sephardic Song. Specialization in Latin American, Italian and Spanish Baroque music, and music of the Sephardim, has taken her all over Europe, North and Latin America. Favorite musical experiences include her many concerts of music from Renaissance Spain with Grant Herreid and Ex Umbris, a North American tour of “Le Canterine Romane” featuring Rossi Cantatas and other early Roman repertoire with Paul O’Dette and Tragicomedia, performing and having the great pleasure of singing with Eduardo Egüez in their duo program “Vaya de Fiesta” and singing on the recording of The Producers with Mel Brooks in the booth. In addition to her performing career, Nell is often sought out for concert curations. Her award-winning programs have been called “revelatory” (BBC Music Magazine), “innovative and brilliant” (Cool Cleveland) and “infectious” (Chicago Tribune). Nell is the co-Artistic Director of GEMAS:Early Music of the Americas, a concert series in NYC, devoted to the Early Music and Performers of Latin America and Canada, which is a project of the Americas Society and GEMS (The Gotham Early Music Scene). As a stage director, Nell brings her love of Baroque Gesture together with a modern sensibility that results in vital and dramatic performances. Her work has been seen at Indiana University, the University of Wisconsin/Madison, Queens College and NYU/Steinhardt School of the Arts and Baroque Chamber Orchestra of Colorado. This summer she returns to the Amherst Early Music Festival as the stage director of Rameau’s Platée. Nell was a student of beloved lute guru, Pat O’Brien. She would like anyone who can still picture him saying, “way cool” to use the phrase with her at least once during the festival.

Nell Snaidas’ Website: nellsnaidas.org

Jeffrey Thompson

American tenor Jeffrey Thompson completed his studies at the College Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati with William McGraw. In 2001, he was awarded First Prize in the Concours International de Chant Baroque de Chimay, Belgium under the jurisdiction of William Christie and selected to participate in the first edition of Jardin Des Voix with the French baroque ensemble, Les Arts Florissants, in a concert tour of Europe’s prestigious theaters. This resulted in a series of performances with Les Arts Florissantsincluding Hercules and Acis & Galatea (Handel), Charpentier’s Messe des morts and Te Deum (recorded for Virgin Classics) and was the tenor soloist in the DVD recording of In Convertendo (Rameau). Operatic and oratorio highlights of his career included the role of Zotico in Cavalli’s Eliogabalo under the direction of René Jacobs, Atys in Rameau’s Les Paladins in Basel, Aldobrandin in Gretry’s Le Magnifique (recorded for Naxos), Lurewel in Montsigny’s Le Roi et Le Fermier (recorded for Naxos), Monsieur Riss in Philidor’s Les Femmes Vengées (recorded for Naxos), Rameau’s Les Fêtes de l’Hymen et de l’Amour (recorded for Naxos) under the direction of Ryan Brown (Opera Lafayette) in New York, Washington and Versailles, the title roles in Rameau’s Hippolyte et Aricie and Platèe, Handel’s Judas Maccabeus and Theodora in Budapest, Acamas in the modern premiere of Royer’s opera Pyrrhus (recorded for the label Versailles Spectacles),the title roles in Rameau’s Castor et Pollux in Sydney (recorded with Pinchgut Opera) and Monteverdi’s Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria in the production of William Kentridge and Philippe Pierlot (Ricercar Consort) in New York, Korea, Versailles, Berlin, Luxembourg and Palermo. An avid recitalist and recording artists, he can be heard on cds including Charpentier’s and Lully’s Te Deum and Son of England both with Vincent Dumestre (Le Poème Hamonique), Buxtehude’s Membra Jesu Nostri with Philippe Pierlot, music of De Negri and Zamboni with Marco Horvat, a cd dedicated to the songs of Henry Lawes, motets of Sebastian de Brossard and sacred anthems for three male voices by Henry Purcell with ensemble La Rêveuse, and a solo cd with gambist, Philippe Pierlot, and theorbist, Daniel Zapico, entitled An Englishman’s Ballad. Future projects include Monteverdi’s Vespers and Handel’s Acis and Galatea and in Canada and Burlington, Vermont with L’Harmonie Des Saisons, Monteverdi’s Vespers with the Rochester based early music ensemble Pegasus and Paul O’Dette, a tour of Dowland lute songs with lutenist, Nigel North, the world premier of Thomas Arne’s opera The Guardian Out-witted with Brandywine Baroque, the title role in Arne’s opera Alfred in Philadelphia, concerts of tenor duets by Monteverdi and newly discovered duets by his contemporaries in Baltimore, concerts of newly discovered vocal music of John Jenkins in Montreal, Handel’s Messiah and Monteverdi’s Vespers in The Netherlands with the Luther Bach Ensemble as well as numerous concerts with harpsichordist/ fortepianist, Elizaveta Miller and her Montreal based ensemble, Les Temps Perdus. After spending twenty years living in Paris, France, Mr. Thompson decided to relocate back to Rochester, New York but continues to perform and record internationally.