Lands of Pure Delight: Seven Decades of Music Making with the Boston Camerata

With an unusually long and distinguished career, immersed at every moment in [early] music and the riches of musical history, the Boston Camerata rejoices in seven decades of historically-informed performance, research, community outreach, and musical education.

October 6, 2024, 2 PM

Remis Auditorium, Museum of Fine Arts

For immediate release (Boston, MA) – It’s 1954: World War II ended less than 10 years ago; the
United States is only 48 states; a visionary woman, Narcissa Williamson, opened the display cases at
the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, letting the precious early instruments be heard in concert. Seventy
years ago, The Boston Camerata was born.

Né the “Camerata of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston”, we, in 1974, morphed into the institution we
are today, and are still honoring Williamson’s desire to revive long-neglected early music, spanning
eight centuries of music history, from the artistocratic to popular, the sacred to secular. We took her
lead, looking to the past to encourage living human connection via the shared joy of great music.

Now in 2024, we return to the MFA – invited by our mother institution for our first live performance
there in 50 years – to celebrate this milestone 70th anniversary. Our superb singers and
instrumentalists will re-create some of those first, pioneering Museum performances. One of the first
Camerata concerts of 1954 featured music of medieval France, which has become a cornerstone of
our repertoire today. The stories from this music are also echoed in some of the visual treasures of the
Museum collections. And, as this is our eras tour, we showcase how we have evolved, presenting
some of our present-day adventures in sound, too.

Tickets are $30 for MFA members, $36 for non-members, and may be purchased here.

This Anniversary Event at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Remis Auditorium is made possible
thanks to a generous gift from Lia and William Poorvu.

Performers

Anne Azema, Artistic Director

Anne Azema, Camila Parias, MaKayla McDonald, Deborah Rentz-Moore
Corey Dalton Hart, Jordan Weatherston Pitts, Luke Scott, voices

with

Jimmy Dransack, vielle, violin and fiddle
Christa Patton, harp and winds
Jesse Lepkoff, recorders, flute, guitar
Carol Lewis, viola da gamba
Salome Sandoval, lute, guitar

Michael Collver, Steve Lundahl, Brian McKay, Mack Ramsey, brass

joined by

Joel Cohen, Music Director Emeritus, guitar
Tod Machover, electronics
Ana Schon, sound mixing

and
Camerata Alumni

About The Boston Camerata

The Boston Camerata occupies a unique place in the densely populated universe of European and
American early music ensembles. Camerata’s distinguished rank stems partly from its longevity:
founded in 1954, when the field of endeavor was in its infancy, as an adjunct to the Boston Museum
of Fine Arts’ musical instruments collection, Camerata is now one of the longest-lived groups to be
vigorously functioning up to the present day.

But length of service, by itself is not sufficient to account for Camerata’s preeminence, nor are its
numerous distinctions including the American Critics’ Circle Award, grants from the National
Endowment for the Arts, residencies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University
of Tennessee, and the Grand Prix du Disque. The Boston Camerata has achieved its eminence in large
part because of its willingness to approach, with consistent success, many kinds of historical
repertoires from many centuries, from the early Middle Ages to the nineteenth century, and from
many places and cultures, stretching from the Middle East to early New England, with numerous
intermediate stops in Renaissance and Baroque Europe and Latin America.

Directed from 1969 to 2009 by Joel Cohen, and from 2009 to the present day by Anne Azema, the
Boston Camerata has continued to create, over more than a half-century of activity, a large number of
concert and media productions. These typically combine scholarship, much of it original, with high
performance standards maintained by a distinguished roster of outstanding vocal soloists and
instrumentalists. Camerata’s productions regularly combine dramatic flair with a certain humane,
overarching perspective on the role music has played in (wo)mankind’s search for meaning and
fulfillment. Camerata’s signature approach, as embodied in its touring, pedagogy, and media projects,
has won the ensemble many listeners and followers on five continents as the ensemble presents new
projects all the while maintaining in active repertoire many of its historic achievements.

For artistic questions, please reach out to Artistic Director, Anne Azema: director@bostoncamerata.org

For other questions, please reach out to Administrator, Victoria Bocchicchio: admin@bostoncamerata.org

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