“French and English Baroque Music for Tenor,” a concert of chamber music presented by Hudson Valley Baroque, featuring Marc Molomot

Imagine the musical circle around Madame de Maintenon, an impoverished French Huguenot who became the devoutly Catholic, influential secret wife of the Sun King, Louis XIV—the monarch who ordered the Protestant Huguenots expelled from France through his 1685 revocation of the Edict of Nantes. Imagine, too, the amorous and bawdy exuberance of London’s musical culture after the end of Oliver Cromwell’s Puritan government in 1658 and the restoration of the British monarchy. These worlds will be conjured by beautiful and expressive music for tenor voice from the French and English Baroque.

The program features works by Louis-Nicolas Clérambault (1676–1749), Jacques-Martin Hotteterre (1674–1763), Henry Purcell (1659–1695), and Johann Christoph Pepusch (1667–1752).

Performers:
- Marc Molomot, tenor
- Joel Evans, oboe
- Ruthanne Schempf, harpsichord
- Christiana Fortune-Reader, viola and violin
- Susan Seligman, cello
- Gregory Bynum, recorder

Admission:
- $20 general admission
- $15 discounted admission for HHS members, seniors, students, active military personnel and their families, and veterans
- $10 youth admission for kids ages 13–17
- Free for children ages 12 and under

Meet the Musicians

Gregory Bynum, recorder player, has studied with Marion Verbruggen, Han Tol, and Mattias Weilenman. He has performed with members of the Mannes School of Music and SUNY New Paltz music faculties, and with Yale music faculty including Jaap Schroeder. Mr. Bynum has taught at the Bloomingdale House of Music in Manhattan and performed at venues including the Morris-Jumel Mansion, the Middletown Thrall Library, and the Old Stone House in Brooklyn. As a member of Hudson Valley Baroque, he has performed in New Paltz, NY, at Historic Huguenot Street and SUNY New Paltz. As a guest performer with Brooklyn Baroque, he can be heard on the ensemble’s recordings Northern Lights, The Pleasures of the French, and Beth Anderson’s The Praying Mantis and the Bluebird (MSR Classics). He has appeared on WKCR and on the Quill Classics YouTube channel with Ensemble Luini. Dr. Bynum is Associate Professor in the School of Education at SUNY New Paltz and founder of the Music at Morris-Jumel chamber music series.

Joël Evans, oboist and solo English hornist with the Hudson Valley Philharmonic, has been a familiar musical voice in the valley for many years. He is oboist with the Poné Ensemble and plays baroque and classical oboes with Hudson Valley Baroque, the resident historic ensemble at SUNY New Paltz, where he also serves as Emeritus Professor of Music.

Dr. Evans has performed with the American Symphony Orchestra and the Atlantic Chamber Orchestra, and was principal oboist of the Albany Symphony from 1982 to 1985. He leads a busy teaching schedule and has played numerous TV and radio advertisements. Joël has recorded for Philo, Rounder, Koch International, CRI, and New World; his playing has been heard across the US, Canada, Europe, Russia, and the Far East. He has appeared as a featured soloist at Lincoln Center, Tanglewood, Saratoga, the Charles Ives Center, and Carnegie Hall. Joël retired as principal oboist of the West Point Band after nearly thirty years of service. Dr. Evans holds degrees from the University of Maine, Columbia University, and the City University of New York.

Christiana Fortune-Reader, violist and violinist, teaches violin and viola in the Music Department at SUNY New Paltz as Assistant Professor of Music and conducts the College Youth Symphony. Before this appointment, she taught at Illinois State University, where she also served as Assistant Principal Viola of the Illinois Symphony Orchestra. She performs regularly with the Minnesota and Cincinnati Symphony Orchestras and the Innigkeit Quartet, and has held positions with the Rochester Philharmonic and the Wichita Symphony Orchestra. She has also performed with the contemporary music ensemble American Wild, a septet dedicated to commissioning new works by American composers inspired by the outdoors and National Parks sites around the United States. She earned a doctoral degree in Performance and Literature from the Eastman School of Music, studying with Carol Rodland, and is completing a doctorate in music education (ABD). She graduated from the University of Southern California (BM) and the Cleveland Institute of Music (MM), studying with Jeffrey Irvine, Lynne Ramsey, Donald McInnes, and Karen Ritscher.

Marc Molomot, tenor, enjoys an international career on opera and concert stages. He has performed with leading early music ensembles and conductors including William Christie, John Eliot Gardiner, Nicholas McGegan, John Nelson, and Andrew Parrott. He has also performed with the Omaha Symphony, Berkshire Choral International, the Mobile Symphony Orchestra, the Nashville Symphony, Israel Camerata Jerusalem, the Rhode Island Philharmonic, the Milwaukee Symphony, Symphony Nova Scotia, the Berkshire Choral Festival, the National Symphony Orchestra of Costa Rica, and at Alice Tully Hall with the American Classical Orchestra.

In opera, he has appeared with the Opéra Comique in Paris, Opéra Toulon, Opéra de Lyon, Kentucky Opera, the Boston Early Music Festival, Opera San José, the Bard Music Festival, the Long Beach Opera, Florentine Opera, Opera Theater of St. Louis, Paris’s Amphithéâtre Bastille, and Haymarket Opera. Molomot sang John Adams in Virgil Thomson’s The Mother of us All at Hudson Hall, named a New York Times “Best Classical Music Performance of 2017,” and Der Hauptmann in the live recording of Berg’s Wozzeck with the Houston Symphony, which won a GRAMMY® Award and an ECHO Klassik Award for Best Opera Recording. His discography includes the GRAMMY®-nominated recording of Lully’s Thésée with the Boston Early Music Festival; GRAMMY®-nominated Il Ritorno di Ulisse in Patria on Linn Records with Boston Baroque; Charpentier’s Judicium Salomonis with Les Arts Florissants, conducted by William Christie; Handel’s Acis and Galatea with Les Boréades, conducted by Eric Milnes; and Monteverdi’s L’Orfeo with Apollo’s Fire, led by Jeannette Sorrell.

Ruthanne Schempf, harpsichordist, is an active chamber and solo musician in the Hudson Valley. She is on the faculties of SUNY New Paltz and Interlochen Arts Camp, and is a member of the Poné Ensemble for New Music. She is also a co-founder of the nonprofit Hudson Valley Society for Music, which produces Potluck Concerts and an annual Hudson Valley BachFest. Dr. Schempf maintains a piano teaching studio and is the organist and choir director at Cornwall Presbyterian Church. She earned undergraduate and master’s degrees from Michigan State University and a D.M.A. from the Manhattan School of Music. Her solo piano recording, An American Mirage: Exotic Piano Images, was released in March 2009 on the MSR Classics label. In her spare time, she likes to ski, garden, and dabble in various domestic activities. She is married to oboist Joël Evans.

Susan Seligman has been principal cellist with the Hudson Valley Philharmonic since 1984. She is a member of the Hudson Valley Philharmonic String Quartet, the piano trio Innisfree, the Poné Ensemble, featuring new and American chamber music, Hudson Valley Baroque, and the Hudson Consort. In 1999, she was favorably reviewed in the New York Times for her performance in works by Robert Starer. In the summer, she is on the faculty of the Chamber Music Institute at Ithaca College. During the academic year, she is on the faculty of SUNY New Paltz and has a private cello studio. Her discography includes CDs on the Albany, Soundspells, and Parnassus Records labels. A recent recording with Innisfree of music by Henry Martin includes Sonata No. 1 for Solo Cello, written for her by the composer.