Festival Concert Series
All events are part of the Amherst Early Music Festival, June 29 to July 13, 2025 on the campus of Muhlenberg College in Allentown, PA
All concerts are at 7:30 pm, except the opera, which begins at 8 pm.
2025 Concert Series Info is coming soon!
Tuesday, July 1, 7:30 p.m. Stolen Roses: Solo works for lute by Biber, Bach, Telemann, Westhoff and Weiss, with Xavier Diaz-Latorre
Playing, singing, dancing, and dining at the Accademia Filarmonica in Verona: Music and Sociability in late Renaissance Italy. One of the first and most successful Renaissance musical academies, the Filarmonica attracted famous performers, promoted composers and instrument makers, and often included women in their activities. This talk will focus on ways that elite sociability--and amateur musicians--and made the academy's success possible. Featuring musical examples performed by AEM Festival faculty and staff
Der getreue Music-Meister - Baroque Academy Faculty Concert
Thursday, July 3, 7:30 p.m.
With Baroque Academy Faculty: Julie Andrijeski violin, Phoebe Carrai cello, Kathryn Cok harpsichord, Saskia Coolen recorder, Sarah Cunningham viol, Heather Miller Lardin double bass, Kathie Stewart flute, and Wouter Verschuren bassoon.
Baroque Opera: Dafne by Georg Reutter
Friday, July 4, 8:00 p.m.
Musical direction by Richard Stone and stage direction by Nell Snaidas, with Jennifer Ellis Kampani, vocal coach, Lawrence Rosenwald, language coach, Dorothy Olsson and Peggy Murray, historical dance, Ronnie Snader, costumes, and Paul Guttry, sets and props.
Georg Reutte's Dafne (1734), is a festa teatrale composed for the imperial family in Vienna. Drawn from Ovid’s Metamorphoses of classical antiquity, the opera sets the myth of woodland nymph Daphne, her desperate flight from Apollo, lovesick from Cupid’s poisoned arrow, and her magical transformation
Faculty Concert: Tapestry of Early Music I
Saturday, July 5, 7:30 p.m.
A variety show of early music through the ages, performed by wonderful AEM faculty using many different instruments and voices. Medieval love songs, Renaissance consort music, high Baroque sonatas, and fantasies that will delight and inspire! Program may include music from Italian composers including Landini, Palestrina, Scarlatti, and Vivaldi, and from Spain, Cabezon, Codex Las Huelgas, Llibre Vermell, Morales, and many others!
In Stile Moderno
Tuesday, July 8, 7:30 p.m.
Misero amante: Songs of Love and Suffering
Enter the world of 17th-century Italy to indulge in every poet’s favorite subject: the joys and pains of love. From the thrill of first attraction to the disappointment of a bad break-up, every moment of the lover’s journey was captured by the most celebrated musicians of the era, including Girolamo Kapsberger, Barbara Strozzi, Giulio Caccini, and Claudio Monteverdi. Alongside light-hearted love songs and heartbreaking laments, the concert will showcase instrumental music for guitars, theorbo, recorder, and cornetto. Agnes Coakley Cox soprano, Nathaniel Cox cornetto, theorbo, guitar, Cameron Welke lute, guitar, theorbo, Dan Meyers recorders, percussion.
Parthenia Viol Consort with Sherezade Panthaki
Thursday, July 10, 7:30 p.m.
ITALIA MIA: Music of Renaissance Venice
Musical performance by viol ensemble Parthenia with Soprano Sherezade Panthaki that explores the extraordinary repertoire for the viola da gamba and voice from the 16th to early 17th centuries. Italy is the birthplace of this instrument, and its earliest flourishing was in Venice where composers, musicians, patrons, citizens, instrument builders, and music publishers all mingled to create some of the most beautiful music ever written.. Rosamund Morley treble viol, Lawrence Lipnik tenor viol, Beverly Au bass viol, Lisa Terry bass viol, with Sherezade Panthaki soprano.
Buxtehude, Bach, & Bach
Friday, July 11, 7:30 p.m.
The Festival's Choral Workshop, directed by Anna Lenti
Program will include pieces by Dieterich Buxtehude (1637 – 1707): Herzlich lieb hab ich dic, O Herr, BuxWV41, Johann Ludwig Bach (1677-1731) Unsere trubsal, and Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-175) Nach dir Herr verlanget mich, BWV 150.
Faculty Concert: Tapestry of Early Music II
Saturday, July 12, 7:30 p.m.
A variety show of early music through the ages, performed by wonderful AEM faculty using many different instruments and voices. Medieval love songs, Renaissance consort music, high Baroque sonatas, and fantasies that will delight and inspire! Program may include music from Italian composers including Landini, Palestrina, Scarlatti, and Vivaldi, and from Spain, Cabezon, Codex Las Huelgas, Llibre Vermell, Morales, and many others!
