Candlelight Concerts: El Fuego (Spanish Renaissance Vocal Music)

Join us on Tuesday, May 28 at 7pm for a Candlelight Concert featuring Cantoría, a Spanish Early Music ensemble on their first-ever US Tour! This one-hour program will feature Spanish Renaissance music sung by an award-winning quartet in the beautiful and historic Christ Church sanctuary.

The performance will be preceeded by a workshop for local singers, choirs, and music enthusiasts, where they can learn a song from Cantoría, and sign it with them at the end of the concert. The workshop will be held from 5:30-6:30pm, with the concert to follow at 7pm. RSVP for free to the workshop here: https://forms.gle/ziPg9k5bz8TDywr78



ABOUT CANTORÍA

Cantoría is a young vocal quartet specialising in the performance of vocal polyphony from the Iberian Renaissance. Freshness, youth and proximity have become distinctive features of the performances of this group, which is beginning to build a remarkable national and international career.

Born at the Escuela Superior de Música de Cataluña-ESMUC (Barcelona), Cantoria took shape at the ECOS Festival Internacional de Música Antigua de Sierra Espuña (Murcia) during the summer of 2016. They were selected in EEEmerging+ (2018), a European cooperation programme for the promotion of emerging ensembles, where they won the Audience Prize of the Ambronay Festival and were chosen to continue in the project for three more years (2018-2021). They have also enriched their experience by participating in the artistic residencies of the International Young Artists Presentation in Antwerp (2017) the Cité de la Voix in Vézelay (2018), Ghislierimusica in Pavia (2019), Händel-Festspiele in Göttingen (2019), National Forum of Music of Wroclaw (2020) or National Center of Early Music of York (2021) as well as in projects such as MusaE (2018 and 2019), the FestClásica circuit (2019), Joventuts Musicals de Catalunya (2020), which has led them to perform in the Auditorium of Barcelona, in the Festival of Torroella de Montgri or in the Hospital Sant Pau of Barcelona. Their performances at festivals such as MA Brugge, AMUZ of Antwerp, A Cappella Festival of Leipzig, Via Aeterna of Mont Saint-Michael, Monteverdi Festival of Cremona represent a line of continuity with respect to their previous performances in other outstanding institutions such as the Prado Museum of Madrid, the National Library of Spain or the Library of Catalonia.

Cantoría collaborates with institutions such as the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, the University of Murcia, the Escola Superior de Música de Catalunya or the Universitat Pompeu Fabra de Barcelona for the dissemination and recovery of the Iberian polyphonic repertoire.

In 2022 they published their first CD, dedicated to the Ensaladas de Mateo Flecha, which won important critical awards such as the "Diapason Dècouverte" label, the "Melómano de Oro" prize or the "Preis del Schallplattenkritik".

Cantoría has participated in special programs for the BBC, France Musique, Deutschlandfunk, Swr3, Radio Clásica, Catalunya Música or Nederlandse Publieke Omroep 2. For 2024 they plan to record their second album, as well as their first tour of the United States.

Cantoría is currently supported by Acción Cultural Española, the Instituto Nacional de las Artes Escénicas y de la Música (INAEM), and the Instituto de las Industrias Culturales y las Artes de Murcia (ICA).