Les Délices' (pronounced Lay DEH-lease) polished, expressive, and dynamic performances of masterpieces and little-known works from the French Baroque have been garnering critical acclaim. Founded in Cleveland in 2006, Les Délices brings together artists with national reputations who share a passion for this exquisite yet seldom heard repertoire. Their performances on period instruments allows them to explore a rich tapestry of tone colors, and the group's name conveys their approach to the music of this era: a delight, a fine delicacy, sumptuous, and exciting. Les Délices' debut CD "The Tastes Reunited"was named one of the "Top Ten Early Music Discoveries of 2009" (NPR's Harmonia), and their performances have been called "a beguiling experience" (Cleveland Plain Dealer), "astonishing" (ClevelandClassical.com), and "first class" (Early Music America Magazine). Les Délices has been featured on WCLV’s Around Noon and WKSU’s In Performance, NPR's syndicated Harmonia and Sunday Baroque, and their debut CD was featured as part of the Audio-guide for a recent special exhibit at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art (Watteau, Music, and Theater). In addition to touring engagements, Les Délices presents their own annual concert series in modern art galleries, where audiences enjoy intimate, informal performances in venues that celebrate Cleveland’s flourishing arts community.

Left to right: Michael Sponseller, Debra Nagy, Scott Metcalfe, Emily Walhout (photo: Liz Linder)

Debra Nagy, baroque oboe and director, performs frequently with baroque ensembles and orchestras in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle, Cleveland, Denver, Boston, Philadelphia, and New York. In addition, Debra performs on shawms and recorders with Ciaramella, a group devoted to fifteenth-century music, and has been a guest with Piffaro, the Newberry Consort, and Blue Heron. She received her doctorate in Early Music at Case Western Reserve University in 2007, where she currently directs the Collegium Musicum. A graduate of Oberlin, Debra was the first-prize winner in the 2002 American Bach Soloists Young Artist Competition, and spent 2002-2003 researching Renaissance double reed instruments in Brussels and Amsterdam as the recipient of a Belgian American Educational Foundation Grant. Debra can be heard on the Capstone, Bright Angel, Naxos, Hänssler Classics, and ATMA labels and has had live performances featured on CBC Radio Canada, Klara (Belgium), WQXR (New York City), WCLV (Cleveland), WKSU (Kent), and WGBH Boston. She loves cooking, gardening, and commuting by bike from her home in the heart of Cleveland's historic Ohio City neighborhood. Debra was awarded a Creative Workforce Fellowship in 2010. The Creative Workforce Fellowship is a program of the Community Partnership for Arts & Culture, generously funded by Cuyahoga Arts and Culture. to top>

Violinist and conductor Scott Metcalfe is the music director of Blue Heron, a vocal ensemble based in Boston which specialises in music between 1400 and 1600 and has been acclaimed by the Boston Globe as “one of the Boston music community’s indispensables.” Blue Heron performs regularly throughout New England and in New York City and has released two CDs, both of which have been greeted with critical praise in North America and Europe. Metcalfe has been invited to serve as guest director by Emmanuel Music (Boston), Monadnock Music (New Hampshire), the Tudor Choir and Seattle Baroque (Seattle, WA), Pacific Baroque Orchestra (Vancouver, BC), and the Dryden Ensemble (Princeton, NJ), in works by Monteverdi, Biber, Buxtehude, Handel, Bach, and others. In January 2010 he led the Green Mountain Project in an all-star 400th-anniversary performance of Monteverdi’s 1610 Vespers in New York City, which the New York Times called “quite simply terrific.” He has recently been appointed Music Director of Early Music America’s first Young Performers Festival, to be held in conjunction with the Boston Early Music Festival in June 2011.

Besides playing in Les Délices, Metcalfe is an active freelancer and a regular participant in Montreal’s early music scene, working with Arion, Montreal Baroque, Les Voix Baroques, and other groups. He also keeps busy writing, teaching, translating, and editing. He is at work on a new complete edition of the songs of Gilles Binchois in collaboration with Sean Gallagher, and is a lecturer in choral repertoire and performance practice at Boston University. Metcalfe received a bachelor’s degree in 1985 from Brown University, where he majored in biology (he is perhaps the only violinist working in early music to have published an article in the Annals of Botany), and in 2005 completed a master’s degree in historical performance practice at Harvard University. to top>

Recently llauded for her "invigorating verve and imagination" by the Washington Post, Julie Andrijeski is among the leading baroque violinists in the U.S.  Her unique musical performance style is greatly influenced by her knowledge and skilled performance of baroque dance, and she often combines these two mediums in the classroom, on stage, and at workshops. Ms. Andrijeski is a full-time Lecturer in the Music Department at Case Western Reserve University where she teaches early music performance practice, baroque dance, and directs the Case/CIM Baroque Orchestra and chamber ensembles. This year she is also Visiting Assistant Professor at Oberlin College. Before joining the Case faculty, Ms. Andrijeski was a full-time member of the early-music trio Chatham Baroque. Now, in addition to her teaching, Ms. Andrijeski regularly appears with many baroque groups including, among others, Quicksilver, Cleveland's Apollo's Fire, the New York State Baroque Orchestra, the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Cecilia's Circle, Spiritus Collective, and the King's Noyse. She has been on the faculties of the Baroque Performance Institute at the Oberlin Conservatory and the Madison Early Music Festival for over a decade, and joined the faculty of the Vancouver Early Music summer festival this year. Ms. Andrijeski received her Doctorate of Musical Arts degree in Early Music from Case Western Reserve University in May 2006. Previous degrees include a B.M. in Violin Performance from the University of Denver (1985) and an M.M. in Violin Performance from Northwestern University (1986).  Her recordings can be found on Dorian Recordings (with Chatham Baroque), Centaur, and Musica Omnia. to top>

Emily Walhout grew up playing the cello, but discovered her love for baroque bass lines at Oberlin Conservatory, where she took up the baroque cello and the viola da gamba, thus launching an active career in early music. Ms Walhout was a founding member of La Luna, and was a member of The King's Noyse from 1987 through 2004. Ms Walhout has played viola da gamba or principal cello for the Boston Early Music Festival Orchestra, Seattle Baroque, Portland Baroque, Les Boreades, Les Violons Du Roy, New York Collegium, and Trinity Consort (Portland, OR). She has toured as a chamber musician throughout North America and Europe, and she has recorded extensively with the Boston Camerata, La Luna and The King's Noyse. A resident of Waterown, MA, Ms Walhout maintains a small studio of private students and coaches several devoted viol consorts. to top>

Cited for his "stylish and soulful playing" Josh Lee leads a mixed up musical life performing on viols and double bass with some of the world's leaders in early music. An alum of the Peabody Conservatory and the Longy School of Music, he studied double bass with Harold Hall Robinson and viols with Ann Marie Morgan and Jane Hershey. Josh is the founder of the ensemble Ostraka, and has performed with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Carmel Bach Festival, Musica Pacifica, Boston Early Music Festival,, Indianapolis Baroque Orchestra, Musica Angelica, Atlanta Baroque Orchestra and Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra. Josh's performances have been heard on Performance Today and Harmonia, and he has recorded for Dorian Sono Luminus, Reference Recordings and Koch International. A resident of San Francisco, Josh is director of the Viola da Gamba Society of America Young Players’ Weekend. to top>

Michael Sponseller has appeared throughout Europe and North America with critical acclaim as a soloist, conductor, and chamber musician. Winner of the American Bach Soloists Competition (1998) and the Jurow International Harpsichord Competition (2002), he holds the distinction of being a two-time prizewinner at the Festival of Flanders International Harpsichord Competition (Bruges), as well as taking prizes in Montréal and Kalamazoo. Mr. Sponseller has performed and recorded frequently with the Handel and Haydn Society, Smithsonian Chamber Players, American Bach Soloists, New York Collegium, Apollo’s Fire and recently, the Carmel Bach Festival. In addition to holding degrees from the Oberlin Conservatory of Music and the Royal Conservatory of Music in The Hague, Mr. Sponseller was a teacher of harpsichord at the Baldwin Wallace Conservatory of Music. To continue to explore his interest in vocal and chamber music on period instruments, he founded Ensemble Florilege in 2007. Mr. Sponseller can also be heard on several recordings from Electra, Vanguard Classics, Naxos, Delos and Centaur. to top>

Lucas Harris began his musical life as a jazz guitarist in his hometown of Phoenix, Arizona.  After graduating summa cum laude from Pomona College, he studied for a year in Milan, Italy as one of the first Marco Fodella Foundation scholars and then at the Hochschule für Künste Bremen.  Lucas now keeps a busy schedule as a continuo player for dozens of Baroque ensembles across North America.  He is the regular lutenist with Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra and is based in Toronto since 2004.  Lucas teaches each summer at Oberlin Conservatory's Baroque Performance Institute and the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute, and has also taught for Amherst Early Music, the International Baroque Institute at Longy, and the New York Continuo Collective.  He is a founder of the Toronto Continuo Collective, a weekly class and performing ‘pluck band’ dedicated to learning the art of seventeenth-century accompaniment.  Some recent projects included a lute concerto program for CBC radio’s Young Artist Series, a solo recital for the Minnesota Guitar Society, a debut solo CD, as well as duo recitals and a recording with the Chinese pipa virtuoso Wen Zhao.  Lucas was music director for a production of Cavalli’s La Calisto for the Opera Program at Ohio State University, and has also been invited as guest director with the Pacific Baroque Orchestra in Vancouver.  He was praised for his work with Les voix humaines in Montréal: “The revelation of the concert was the Torontonian lutenist Lucas Harris, who weaved a poetic thread through his infinitely subtle interventions.  The sweetness and patience of his playing . . . was astonishing.”  (Le Devoir) to top >

Soprano Ellen Hargis is one of America’s premier early music singers, specializing in repertoire ranging from ballads to opera and oratorio. She has worked with many of the foremost period music conductors of the world, including Andrew Parrott, Gustav Leonhardt, Daniel Harding, Paul Goodwin, John Scott, Monica Huggett, Jane Glover, Nicholas Kraemer, Harry Bickett, Simon Preston, Paul Hillier, Craig Smith, and Jeffery Thomas. She has performed with The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, The Virginia Symphony, Washington Choral Arts Society, Long Beach Opera, CBC Radio Orchestra, Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, Tragicomedia, The Mozartean Players, Fretwork, the Seattle Baroque Orchestra, Emmanuel Music and the Mark Morris Dance Group. Ellen Hargis has performed at many of the world's leading festivals including the Adelaide Festival (Australia), Utrecht Festival (Holland), Resonanzen Festival (Vienna), Tanglewood, the New Music America Festival, Festival Vancouver, the Berkeley Festival (California), and is a frequent guest at the Boston Early Music Festival. Her discography embraces repertoire from medieval to contemporary music. She has recently recorded the leading role of Aeglé in Lully’s Thésée for CPO, nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording in 2008, as well as Conradi’s opera Ariadne, also nominated for a Grammy Award. She is featured on a dozen Harmonia Mundi recordings including a critically acclaimed solo recital disc of music by Jacopo Peri, and in Arvo Pärt's Berlin Mass with Theatre of Voices, and two recital discs with Paul O’Dette on Noyse Productions.

Ellen Hargis teaches voice at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, and is Artist-in-Residence with the Newberry Consort at the University of Chicago and Northwestern University. to top>

A native of Seattle, the soprano Clara Rottsolk has been lauded by The New York Times for her “clear, appealing voice and expressive conviction” and by The Philadelphia Inquirer for the “opulent tone [with which] every phrase has such a communicative emotional presence.” In a repertoire extending from the Renaissance to the contemporary, she has appeared as soloist with ensembles such as Tempesta di Mare, St Thomas Church Fifth Avenue, Philadelphia Bach Collegium, Trinity Wall Street Choir, Baltimore Chamber Orchestra, Bach Sinfonia, Handel Choir of Baltimore, and Ensemble Florilège under conductors including Joshua Rifkin, Bruno Weill, John Scott, David Effron, and Andrew Megill. As a recitalist, she has performed throughout the US, in venues including the Goethe-Institut Boston, St. Mark’s Church Philadelphia and Swarthmore College, and at the Carmel Bach Festival, Whidbey Island Music Festival, and the Brevard Music Center. Among her stage roles are Micaëla (Carmen), Dido (Dido and Aeneas), Arminda (La finta giardiniera) and Laetitia (The Old Maid and the Thief).

Her upcoming season includes performances with Handel Choir of Baltimore, Piffaro—The Renaissance Wind Band, Les Délices, and appearances at the Carmel Bach Festival and Indianapolis Early Music Festival. She can also be heard on recording with Tempesta di Mare Chamber Players on the Chandos label. to top>

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