Come explore the passion and revelry of 17th-century Venice through music by Monteverdi, Cavalli, and Strozzi alongside spirited Carnival dances.
This concert pairs Napoleon and Joséphine's passionate, and often hilarious, letters with songs and salon music from Napoleonic-era France and Spain.
Experience the profound drama and spiritual power of Bach’s St. John Passion, one of the greatest masterpieces of the Baroque era. From moments of intense conflict to passages of profound beauty and reflection, Bach creates an unforgettable musical journey through suffering, redemption, and hope. A cornerstone of the sacred repertoire, this masterpiece continues to inspire and move audiences three centuries later.
Joining the Tuesday Concert Series at The Church of the Epiphany, Soprano Elissa Edwards and lutenist Richard Kolb present selections from their new CD of music from Opus 3, and tuneful songs in a lighter vein from her Opus 6.
Johannes Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem, sung in English, is one of the most moving choral masterpieces ever composed. Rather than focusing on death, Brahms offers comfort, hope, and consolation to the living through texts he selected from Scripture. Sweeping choruses, tender solos, and luminous orchestral writing create a deeply human work of compassion and remembrance. Performed by Bach in Baltimore’s orchestra, chorus, and soloists, this timeless masterpiece speaks across generations with a universal message of peace, healing, and hope for all humanity.
In celebration of the women who shaped the early American republic, this concert spotlights the music associated with the wives, daughters, and salon hosts of America’s founding leaders. Through music preserved in their collections and stories drawn from their lives, Leading Ladies of Liberty traces the influence of figures like Martha Jefferson Randolph, Dolley Madison, and Elizabeth Monroe. These women were tastemakers, hostesses, and quiet strategists, and their cultural imprint is captured in the domestic music they cherished. With repertoire spanning sentimental ballads, genteel salon songs, and patriotic airs, the program celebrates the grace and resilience of women who upheld the republic’s private and public spheres.
Bach’s Mass in B Minor is arguably among the greatest musical compositions in any tradition. Through this work, Bach has given us a reservoir of comfort and healing for the soul. Although he likely never performed the work in its entirety during his lifetime, Bach’s surviving documents suggest a plan for its complete performance. Today, the work remains among the most treasured of any era.
Bach’s Mass in B Minor is arguably among the greatest musical compositions in any tradition. Through this work, Bach has given us a reservoir of comfort and healing for the soul. Although he likely never performed the work in its entirety during his lifetime, Bach’s surviving documents suggest a plan for its complete performance. Today, the work remains among the most treasured of any era.
Join us for a powerful performance of Handel’s oratorio Judas Maccabeus, a stirring celebration of heroism, faith, and victory. This dramatic and uplifting work features majestic choruses, expressive solos, and dynamic orchestral writing, brought to life in the beautiful setting of Baltimore Hebrew Congregation. Experience one of Handel’s most beloved masterpieces performed by Bach in Baltimore’s talented ensemble.
Join the Washington Bach Consort for their Noontime Cantatas - Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen BMW 56 on March 2 & 3! This is a free concert with general admission seating.
Join the Washington Bach Consort for their Noontime Cantatas - Ich will den Kreuzstab gerne tragen BMW 56 on March 2 & 3! This is a free concert with general admission seating.
An intimate Valentine’s concert honoring friendship, longing, and lyric beauty through the lens of 17th-century literary salons. This unique performance centers on the poetry of Katherine Philips, known as “the Matchless Orinda,” alongside music by Henry Lawes, John Wilson, and Mary Dering. Performed with voice and theorbo, and interwoven with spoken readings, With Quill and Voice illuminates the world of early modern women and their creative communities—where poetry and music blossomed by candlelight.
Anchored in the conviviality of 18th-century Annapolis, this candlelit concert draws from the seasonal music, dance, and poetry that enlivened colonial homes during the Twelve Days of Christmas. Now in its tenth year, this beloved Twelfth Night tradition opens the nation’s 250th anniversary year with spirited songs that reflect both elite and popular customs of winter festivity in the early Republic.
Fireside Revelry recreates the warmth and mischief of Annapolis’s historic parlors with English glees and catches, Scottish airs long favored in Virginia, traditional wassail and feast songs, and American parlor works by Francis Hopkinson—the first composer of secular song in the colonies. At its center stands William Billings’s stirring I Am the Rose of Sharon, a richly layered anthem by the “father of American choral music.”
Interwoven with toasts, diary entries, and seasonal verse, this tenth-anniversary program celebrates a decade of Twelfth Night concerts at Hammond-Harwood House, while honoring the blend of elegance, revelry, and patriotic spirit that shaped music-making in early America.
Elissa Edwards joins the Washington Bach Consort in their joyous annual performance of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio. This heartwarming, joy-filled tradition sets the perfect tone for a bright and festive holiday season.
Experience the pinnacle of Baroque sacred music with Bach’s monumental Mass in B Minor. Majestic, deeply spiritual, and musically breathtaking, this masterwork weaves together intricate choral writing, powerful solos, and transcendent orchestration. Performed in the stunning acoustics of St. Joseph Parish, this special concert is a soul-stirring journey through one of the greatest achievements in Western music.
This program conjures the shadowy musical world of haunted harbors, shipwrecks, and sailor’s lore. Drawing from centuries of maritime song, the concert presents a moody mix of dramatic storytelling and spirited sea shanties—songs of longing, danger, superstition, and survival. Audiences are invited into a candlelit evening of stormy ballads and eerie melodies, where ghost ships sail and lost loves haunt the waves. Told through gripping narration and stirring historic songs, the program traces the music of sailors, dockside balladeers, and superstitious souls. From stormy laments to rollicking tavern tunes, this performance weaves an evocative spell perfect for fans of folklore, history, and the supernatural.
Empressa Ensemble brings Jodi Goble’s evocative opera Isle of the Fay to Baltimore’s historic Carroll Mansion. Inspired by Poe’s haunting tale the work explores a dreamlike encounter between the mortal and the supernatural, set against the museum’s atmospheric backdrop.
Join us and the Jane Austen Society of North America (JASNA) in Baltimore’s harbor for Maritime Merriment: Songs from the Seafaring Regency. Performed by Elissa Edwards (soprano), David Evans (tenor), Jane Yoo (harp), and Laura Byrne (flute).
From Rule, Britannia! to The Soldier’s Adieu, our concert sails through the music Austen herself would have known — and loved.
As part of the International Poe Festival, Empressa Ensemble performs in the crypt of Westminster Hall. The program highlights the intersection of music, memory, and atmosphere within this historic site.
An evening devoted to Le Virtuose: The Music of Francesca Caccini and Barbara Strozzi draws listeners into a world that is both refined and daring. Caccini and Strozzi — two of the most remarkable women of 17th-century Europe — created music of luminous beauty and originality while navigating a culture that often sought to silence them. Their works carry a rare blend of sensuality, wit, and poignancy, evoking both the intimacy of private salons and the vitality of the public stage.
This program weaves together arias and cantatas works by Caccini, Strozzi, and their circle — repertoire once overshadowed by their male contemporaries but now valued for its expressive depth and imaginative scope. Heard in the intimacy of a private gathering, this music reveals its full brilliance: immediate, affecting, and richly alive.
This is a private, invite-only event.
Giovanni Pergolesi's Stabat Mater is considered one of the masterworks of the Italian Baroque period, its achingly beautiful phrases evoking the pain and anguish of the suffering and death of Christ. Set in this performance with sparse orchestration and paired with other works by contemporaries J.S. Bach and Vivaldi, we invite you to dwell in the beauty and power of these works from the heart of the Baroque.
Elissa Edwards will be performing once again with Bach in Baltimore in “Haydn the Creation” along with Ben Ellerin (tenor) and Phillip Collister (bass) at the Baltimore Hebrew Congregation.
"First there was Chaos…swirling, random sounds, then suddenly, in one of the most astonishing musical explosions, there was Light! And life began. Haydn’s magnificent oratorio, the Creation has it all: Archangels singing heroic recitatives and operatic arias, monumental choruses and 4-part fugues (The Heavens are Telling) and even a love duet between Adam and Eve. Haydn poured his symphonic genius, his operatic mastery, his humor, and his joyful spirit into this masterpiece. Experience the Creation, Haydn’s extraordinary celebration of planet earth with Bach in Baltimore.”
Elissa joins the Washington Bach Consort in their performance of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio Parts 1, 2, 3, 6 at the Music Center at Strathmore.
“In what has become the Washington Bach Consort’s signature work, you can enjoy this performance in the spectacular Music Center at Strathmore for what The Washington Post praises as a “splendid” and “joyful” rendering of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio. Of all seasonal offerings, this work is uniquely focused on the complete story of the Nativity. The Bach Consort is one of very few ensembles in the nation to present this beloved European tradition annually.”
Elissa joins Harmonia Stellarum in this wonderful Advent season performance.
“Giovanni Girolamo Kapsberger’s Pastori di Bettelemme constitutes one of the earliest Christmas oratorios in music history, composed for a performance on Christmas Eve 1629 in the Apostolic Palace in Rome. We pair it with the first American performance of the anonymous Historia von der Gebuhrt Christi from 1686, today in the Saxon State Library Dresden.”
Join us for The House of Shadows: A Concert of Haunting Baroque Music in the historic ballroom of the Hammond-Harwood House. Set in the eerie glow of candlelight, this evening promises an unforgettable fusion of music, poetry, and spine-tingling surprises. Shelby Yamin will mesmerize on violin with The Devil’s Trill the famous Violin Sonata in G minor by Giuseppe Tartini, Dr. Paula Maust will enchant on harpsichord with Bach’s Toccata and Fugue in D minor, BWV 565. Soprano Elissa Edwards, acclaimed for her “pliant, seductive, free-ranging voice” (Gramophone), will deliver chilling arias by Monteverdi, Vivaldi, and Handel. Prepare for a night of “musical tricks and treats” — from the menacing to the ethereal, each piece is sure to be a delightful fright! An evening where musical artistry intertwines with ghostly tales and evocative poetry, guiding you through realms both ominous and sublime.
The earliest music for violin at the transition from the Renaissance to the Baroque were arrangements of vocal music to which the performers added improvised, virtuosic ornamentation, so-called diminutions. You are in for a virtuosic firework—set off upon fascinating early 17th-century masterworks by female composers Caterina Assandra, Sulpitia Cesis, Alba Tressina, and Claudia Rusca—by our concert master Manami Mizumoto and Will Copeland, accompanied by lute and our fabulous new organ.
Spend an evening with Major General Lafayette and your American Friends of Lafayette hosts at the final ticketed event of our 5-day bicentennial tribute in Baltimore, a “Farewell Lafayette Soirée” sendoff starting at 5:30 PM. Immerse yourself in a journey through time, experiencing a unique blend of 19th century American and French history coupled with live music and theater and a fine Franco-American cocktail buffet. Explore the beautifully restored Peale Museum Lafayette visited 200 years ago where the art of story-telling has a new life. Peruse the informative display panels that illustrate Lafayette’s contributions to American democratic ideals. Enjoy the debut of a historical musical production about Lafayette’s Baltimore visit, and indulge in a feast for the senses. This evening guarantees an unforgettable experience.
Join us at the International Poe Festival with Poe Baltimore for Enter the Dark: A Musical Experience with Edgar Allan Poe. This concert brings Poe’s iconic poetry to life through captivating music and dramatic readings.
Generously hosted by the Edgar Allan Poe House and Museum / Poe Baltimore
Featured soloist for a performance at the Carroll Mansion with the Poe Museum
Bach in Baltimore & the Maryland State Boys choir, soloist
Bach in Baltimore & the Maryland State Boys choir