Event

Orphans & Ladies

Collegium Cincinnati to present music from Venice not heard in 300 years, performed by all-female orchestra & chorus.

It was commonly known in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries that for the most transcendent musical experience in all of Europe, one needed to travel to Venice; not to the opera houses, or even the main Basilica, but rather to one of four 'orphanages' (ospedali) where music was played daily by the girls and women that lived and worked there. Hidden behind screens so that their beauty wouldn't interfere with the spiritual experience of the music, the women of the coro provided some of the most virtuosic and technically astounding performances in all of Europe.

This fall, Collegium Cincinnati will recreate the experience of hearing a complete ospedale service; set in the beautiful Christ Church Cathedral, girls and women from musical organizations throughout Cincinnati will come together to bring to life the music that would have been heard in the Venetian ospedali, some of which hasn't been heard since it was originally performed nearly three hundred years ago.

When the last of the ospedali closed at the end of the eighteenth century, the legacy left was that of the model for modern conservatories. Not since then has such attention been paid to the contribution of female musicians in the Western tradition.

Singers and orchestra members will be drawn from professional, educational, and vocational choral organizations throughout the city, including Christ Church Cathedral, Xavier University, the Young Professionals' Choral Collective, the May Festival Chorus, and the Vocal Arts Ensemble.
Repertoire to include:

Baldassare Galuppi: Mundi salus
Johann Adolph Hasse: Miserere in c minor
Antonio Vivaldi: Filiae maestae Jerusalem
Performance Information:

Sunday, October 19 | 5:00 pm
Christ Church Cathedral