In March 2025, the Phantasm Viol Consort launched its own concert series at St. Elisabeth Church in Berlin-Mitte. The series comprises four concerts, each devoted entirely to polyphony and spotlighting a composer especially renowned for mastery of this compositional technique.
With Orlando Gibbons, Peerless Polyphonist, the second concert in the series, Phantasm celebrates on 12 October 2025 one of the most important musicians in British history, marking the 400th anniversary of his death this year. Orlando Gibbons composed during the transitional period between the Elizabethan era and the Baroque, and is regarded as one of the last representatives of England’s polyphonic school. Even in his lifetime he enjoyed great popularity among patrons and audiences, and has been revered by musicians ever since: William Byrd, his contemporary, called him a “musical genius,” while Glenn Gould described his music as that which had “moved me more deeply than any other sound experience.”
“In his music, one senses a particular sensitivity both to melancholy and suffering as well as to joy and exultation in life,” says Laurence Dreyfus, founder and musical director of Phantasm. A taste of this can be found in the ensemble’s 2004 Gibbons recording, which won a Gramophone Award: “This is classy playing and a major contribution to the catalogue.”
In the Klassikfavori podcast series by Sabine Weber, Laurence Dreyfus spoke extensively about Orlando Gibbons on 3 June 2025.
The two remaining concerts in the series will be dedicated to Henry Purcell and William Lawes. With this series, Phantasm aims not only to promote the rarely heard English polyphonic repertoire in Berlin, but also to foster direct engagement with audiences. After each concert, the ensemble warmly invites attendees to enjoy a complimentary drink and informal conversation at the bar—your chance to ask anything you’ve ever wanted to know about viols, consort playing, and more!
POLYPHONISCHE BEGEGNUNGEN – POLYPHONIC ENCOUNTERS
Save the date – concerts season 2025/26
Concert II – Orlando Gibbons, Peerless Polyphonist
Sunday, 12 October 2025, 05.00 p.m, St. Elisabeth
Concert III – Peerless Purcell: Fantasies in Full
Sunday, 11 January 2026, 05.00 p.m, St. Elisabeth
Concert IV – William Laws, Exceptional Eccentric
Sunday, 8 March 2026, 05.00 p.m, St. Elisabeth
Author: Andrea Kerner
Next concerts & new ensembles
They’re breaking boundaries, diving into fresh sound worlds, and blowing audiences away every time! With Pynarello and the Rubiks Collective, we’re thrilled to welcome two bold, young ensembles to our family – and with the International Bachakademie Stuttgart, yet another sparkling gem of the original-sound scene! Plus: we’re hitting the road again soon – from Europe to Asia all the way to Canada!
- Oberon Trio & Ian Bostridge
- Phantasm Viol Consort
- Sarah Willis & The Sarahbanda
- Building Bridges Pianists
- Camerata Salzburg & Janine Jansen
- Chamber Orchestra of Europe
PURE MAGIC
In September, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra teams up once again with the brilliant vocal ensemble Vox Luminis for a performance of their acclaimed interpretation of Bach’s Mass in B minor at St. James’s, Spanish Place in London. The concert is part of the Wigmore Hall’s concert series. “Pure magic”, declared the Stuttgarter Zeitung after their performance at the Beethovenfest Bonn in September 2024.
18 September 2025, St. James’s, Spanish Place, London
MASS IN B MINOR
Erika Tandiono, soprano / Sophia Faltas, soprano / Victoria Cassano, mezzo-soprano / William Shelton, countertenor / Raphael Höhn, tenor / Sebastian Myrus, bass / Felix Schwandtke, bass / Lionel Meunier, bass & musical leader / Vox Luminis / Freiburg Baroque Orchestra
J. S. Bach: Mass in B minor BWV 232
NORWAY IN NOTES
Benedicte Maurseth and Kristine Tjøgersen are part of a new generation of Norwegian composers whose work deeply engages with ecology, place, and our perception of the natural world. Their joint composition Elja is rooted in the landscape of Hardangervidda, Europe’s largest mountain plateau. Among the featured “performers”: the rock ptarmigan, snowy owl, wolverine, Eurasian whimbrel, and Lapland longspur. The tireless Kronos Quartet performs on newly developed and adapted traditional instruments such as the Hardanger fiddle, Hardanger viola, and Hardanger cello. Benedicte Maurseth herself appears as soloist on the Hardanger fiddle.
Following its European premiere in Oslo, the work will be performed again at Festival Musica in Strasbourg. There, the quartet will present an additional program specially conceived to confront the pressing issues of our time.
18 September 2025, Ultima Festival, Oslo / 20 September 2025, Festival Musica, Strasbourg
ELJA
David Harrington, violin / Gabriela Díaz, violin / Ayane Kozasa, viola / Paul Wiancko, cello / Benedicte Maurseth, Hardanger fiddle
B. Maurseth & K. Tjøgersen: Elja
21 September 2025, Festival Musica, Straßburg
A WORLD WE LIVE IN
David Harrington, violin / Gabriela Díaz, violin / Ayane Kozasa, viola / Paul Wiancko, cello
N. Lizée: Death to Kosmische / N. Young Ohio (arr. by Paul Wiancko) / M. Kouyoumdjian: Bombs of Beirut / N. Simone: For all we know / Consumation (arr. Jacob Garchik) / T. Riley: One Earth One People One Love / H. Guõnadóttir: Fólk fær andlit / S. Reich: Different Trains
NO KING
Major political upheavals shaped European history and form the backdrop – or sometimes the very impulse – for works that reflect and transcend their time. Mozart and Beethoven witnessed monarchy, revolution, and the beginnings of European democratization. Il Giardino Armonico and the NFM Choir, under the direction of Giovanni Antonini, trace this historical arc through music.
11 September 2025, De Singel, Antwerpen
CROWN & REVOLUTION
Giovanni Antonini, conductor / Il Giardino Armonico / NFM Choir
W. A. Mozart: Overture to Idomeneo, K. 366 / Kyrie in D minor “Munich Kyrie”, K. 342 / Mass in C major “Coronation Mass”, K. 317 / L. v. Beethoven: Symphony No. 3 in E-flat major, Op. 55 “Eroica”
season start
With great momentum, we and our orchestras and ensembles are launching into the 2025/26 season – from Ravello to Oslo, from Bach to Bernstein.
- Phantasm Viol Consort
- Building Bridges Pianists
- Kent Nagano & Dresdner Philharmonie
- Vox Luminis
- Freiburg Baroque Orchestra
- Chamber Orchestra of Europe
- Compagnia di Punto
- Il Giardino Armonico
- Sarah Willis & Mozart y Mambo
- Kronos Quartet
- Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
- Finnish Baroque Orchestra
FESTIVO Opening
The Orchestra of the 18th Century will open this year’s edition of Festivo with a Mozart and Haydn program. The concert will be conducted by concertmaster Alexander Janiczek and take place in the atrium of Schattdecor—a spectacular new venue of the festival. The soloist is Rachel Podger, “the unsurpassed British glory of the baroque violin,” as The Times describes her.
25 July 2025, Festivo, Aschau
OPENING CONCERT
R. Podger, violin / A. Janiczek, concert master & musical leader
Works by W.-A. Mozart & J. Haydn
Καλημέρα!
After a universally acclaimed concert in 2024, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe has once again been invited to the Epidaurus Festival this year. Under the baton of Constantinos Carydis, the orchestra will perform works by Liszt, Purcell, and Berlioz, as well as the world premiere of O Lightless Light! – Ode to Oedipus, a new composition by Greek composer Periklis Koukos.
10 July 2025, Epidaurus Festival – Odeon of Herodes Atticus, Athen
O LIGHTLESS LIGHT! – ODE TO OEDIPUS
Francesco Piemontesi, piano / Sofia Tamvakopoulou, piano / Tassis Christoyannis, baritone / Constantinos Carydis, conductor
Works by P. Koukos, F. Listz, H. Purcell, H. Berlioz
Geaechinger Cantorey
Since its founding in 1981 by Helmuth Rilling, the Internationale Bachakademie Stuttgart has been dedicated to the music of Johann Sebastian Bach through benchmark-setting performances and vibrant educational initiatives. This mission also embraces the music of Bach’s contemporaries, as well as his predecessors and successors. With Bach at its core, the Bachakademie’s repertoire encompasses sacred vocal music, oratorios, and choral symphonic works from the 17th century to the present day.
Since 2013, the institution has been led by conductor Hans-Christoph Rademann, who in 2016 unified the former ensembles Gächinger Kantorei (choir) and Bach-Collegium Stuttgart (orchestra) into a newly restructured ensemble consisting of a reformed choir and a newly founded Baroque orchestra under the name Gaechinger Cantorey. In this ensemble, a Baroque orchestra and a carefully selected choir form a finely tuned original-sound ensemble. Under the direction of artistic director Hans-Christoph Rademann, the ensemble has made it its mission to promote an internationally recognized “Stuttgart Bach style.”
The Internationales Bachfest Stuttgart, a two-week festival, brings together young and seasoned artists from around the world who devote themselves to Bach and his era. Additionally, the Bachakademie maintains its own subscription concert series in Stuttgart and Ludwigsburg and is actively engaged in a busy concert schedule both nationally and internationally.
VIDEO
PRESS
“What Hans-Christoph Rademann, his Gaechinger Cantorey, and the carefully selected soloists reveal here in terms of vocal-instrumental balance, tonal refinement, and rhetorically informed artistry surely represents the pinnacle of historically informed performance today!”
concerti, 13 november 2023
“To the audience of 2023, it spoke directly from the heart.”
bachtrack, 16 july 2023
PROJECTS 2027/28 – A SELECTION
April 2028
ST. JOHN PASSION
Choir and Orchestra ot Gaechinger Cantorey / Hans-Christoph Rademann, conductor
The Gaechinger Cantorey, under the direction of Hans-Christoph Rademann, has set itself the goal of promoting a “Stuttgart Bach style” internationally. Among the many milestones achieved since its reestablishment in 2016, the St John Passion undoubtedly stands out—its emotional complexity is explored in remarkable depth and performed with great passion by both the ensemble and its conductor.
L. v. Beethoven: Missa solemnis op.123
