SalonEra

The lines separating earthly desire from holy rapture become blurry in this audio-only episode featuring music by Handel from Les Délices’ April program Starstruck featuring Hannah De Priest.

Guests Yiheng Yang, Aisslinn Nosky, Mark Edwards, and Shelby Yamin join SalonEra for music & conversation centering late-18th century female pianist-composers Marianne Mozart, Jane Mary Guest, Maddalena Lombardini Sirmen, and others.

Nicaragua’s awe-inspiring volcanoes and vast caldera lakes have inspired countless myths and legends. We focus on the Legend of the Masaya Lagoon in this audio-only episode featuring live performances from Les Délices’ February program La Diosa and excerpts from a new commission by Nicaraguan-American composer Gilda Lyons.

Guests Kim Gruenwald and Dominic Giardino consider the music and sounds that reverberated across the western frontier as French, English, new American settlers, and Native Americans pushed westward in the decades following the Revolutionary War.

Lions and tigers and bears! Oh my! LD Artistic Director Debra Nagy and cellist Rebecca Landell share Baroque music inspired by the animal kingdom in this audio-only episode featuring recent live performances of music by Biber, Pasquini, and others.

Together with conductor Anthony Trecek-King and ethnomusicologist Gibb Schreffler, SalonEra probes the history and evolution of sea shanties and related work songs from the eighteenth to twentieth centuries. Featuring live concert recordings by Seán Dagher with Les Délices and more.

Czech music scholar Martin Nedbal explores how 18th century Bohemian composers subtly incorporated folk tunes and inflections of their homeland despite cultural suppression under Hapsburg rule in this audio-only episode featuring live performances from Les Délices’ October program Bohemian Rhapsody.

SalonEra considers the legacies of blind and visually-impaired historical composer-performers like Jacob van Eyck, Turlogh O’Carollan, and others and talks with vision-impaired harpsichordist & violinist Albano Berberi, lutenist Lucas Harris, and Braille music engraver Kathleen Cantrell.

LD Artistic Director Debra Nagy and host Hannah De Priest explore the strange and beautiful music of the ars subtilior in this audio-only episode featuring live performances from Les Délices’ November 2024 program 14th Century Avant-garde. Featuring music by Machaut, Senleches, and others with performances by Debra Nagy, (winds, voice, harps), Scott Metcalfe (vielle and Gothic harp) Sophie Michaux (mezzo-soprano) and James Reese (tenor).

Drawing inspiration from a range of non-Western musical traditions as well as historical events, SalonEra shines a light on artists doing fascinating work that centers cultural exchange. Setar virtuoso Kiya Tabassian (Constantinople), Indian-American soprano Vidita Kanniks, and Thai-American violinist Sallynee Amawat (Infusion Baroque) join us to share recent work that thoughtfully bridges traditions.

Legendary period clarinetist Eric Hoeprich shares insights on Mozart and looks back on his own career highlights in this audio-only episode featuring live performances from Les Délices’ October program for wind octet, Moonlit Mozart.

Myth Then & Now spotlights artists whose recent projects reflect mythology’s contemporary resonance. Guests Sophie Michaux & Adam Simon (Tiny Glass Tavern) share a recent performance centering St. Cecilia while Les Délices previews their recent world-premiere of “A Moment’s Oblivion” by composer Viet Cuong. Additional guests to be announced.

SalonEra partners with the Boulanger Initiative to spotlight enterprising women composers from mid-eighteenth-century England, Elizabeth Turner and Elisabetta de Gambarini. Featuring brand new recordings from Les Délices and harpsichordist Paula Maust plus insights from Dr. Alison DeSimone (author of Women and the Business of Performance in Eighteenth-Century Britain).

What is it about beautiful women with tails and fins? Are they seductive, dangerous, or both? SalonEra explores The Mermaid and other tantalizing beasts through ballad tunes and songs in this audio-only episode featuring live performances from Les Délices’ April 2024 concerts with special guest Seán Dagher.

Soprano Hannah De Priest and harpsichordist Mark Edwards talk with Artistic Director Debra Nagy in this audio-only episode featuring live performances from Les Délices’ October 2024 performances of Arcadian Dreams, in which faithful shepherds fall prey to love’s fateful snares. Featuring music by Handel, Scarlatti, and Bourgeois.

Join us for French Baroque portrayals of the Orpheus myth featuring beautifully recorded performances of works by Rameau, Courbois, and Jonathan Woody from Les Délices’ digital catalog paired with fresh interviews.

Focusing on the extraordinary music of Black composers and friends Margaret Bonds and Florence Price, who came to Chicago as part of the Great Migration, this episode features exciting  recordings and insights from leading scholar-musicians including Dr. Samantha Ege, Dr. Christine Jobson, and soprano Michele Kennedy.

How did Medieval artists get exposed to new music, pick up new skills or instruments, and develop their artistry? Guests Allison Monroe (Trobár) and Liza Malamut (Newberry Consort) share performances from a program that explored 14th and 15th century Medieval “Minstrel Schools,” where musicians from across Europe gathered to exchange ideas, repertoire, and more.

In this exclusive podcast episode about Les Délices' 2023-24 Concert Series closer, Season Transformed, we explore the legacy of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons.

In this exclusive audio-only re-release of The Phoenix of Mexico from SE's second season, bassoonist Catalina Guevara Víquez Klein, violinist Karin Cuellar Rendon, and mezzo-soprano Raquel Winnica Young explore personal connections to Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz (1648-1695).

We’re releasing podcast episodes about select Les Délices programs this year. This podcast episode features interviews with artists and excerpts from Les Délices' forthcoming album The Highland Lassie.

An exclusive episode about Les Délices 2023-24 Season Opener: a special collaboration featuring Kaleidoscope Vocal Ensemble’s all-star team of vocalists. This inspiring program mixes music by Henry Purcell and living composers Jonathan Woody, Sydney Guillaume, and Caroline Shaw.

A man of letters, merchant, abolitionist, theater lover, and musician, Charles Ignatius Sancho made history as the first British man of African descent to vote in a general election. We explore Sancho’s life and legacy in this new episode that includes performances and interviews with Jonathan Woody, Reggie Mobley, Rebecca Cypess, Nicole Aljoe, and other special guests.

Together with acclaimed Bach scholar Michael Marissen, harpsichordist Mark Edwards, and pianist Dror Biran, we go Inside the Goldbergs to explore Bach’s momentous work and consider the unique challenges and opportunities that Bach’s music has for us all.

Renaissance lute songs, African American Spirituals, and traditional Lebanese melodies become vehicles for storytelling as Michael Walker (countertenor) and Haitham Haidar (tenor) explore themes of identity and representation, struggle and resilience, and community and belonging.

Henry VIII’s flagship the Mary Rose sank in 1545 with a chest full of instruments on board. We talk with polymaths Allison Monroe and Peter Walker about telling the ship’s story through music alongside featured performances from medieval ensemble Trobár.