ASPECT Presents Sherezade Panthaki And The Four Nations Ensemble In FETE GALANTE: THE ANATOMY OF MELANCHOLY

The ASPECT Foundation for Music & Arts presents its final concert of the season, Fête Galante: The Anatomy of Melancholy on Thursday, May 17, 2018 at 7:30pm at the Italian Academy at Columbia University, part of the foundation's second New York City season of illuminating performances featuring many of the most prominent performers and musical scholars of today. Féte Galante features the acclaimed New York-based Four Nations Ensemble and soprano Sherezade Panthaki, with an illustrated talk by art historian Tav Holmes.

The concert provides insight into the elegant new style of art following the final years of the reign of Louis XIV. While Versailles was draped in the heavy mood of recent years, Antoine Watteau was breaking with tradition, creating the new fresh, elegant, and sensual genre of the fête galante. The evening features Four Nations Ensemble and Panthaki in works by Leclair, Clérambault, Devienne, and Telemann to emphasize Holmes' glimpse into the unique, idealized world of artists Watteau, Boucher, and Fragonard.

Tickets: $45 includes wine and refreshments
Link: https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/3065574

Founded in 1986, The Four Nations Ensemble brings together soloists, frontrunners from several generations, who are leading exponents of period instrument and vocal performance. With a core ensemble of soprano, harpsichord or fortepiano, 2 violin, flute, and cello, Four Nations' repertory runs from the Renaissance through Viennese Classical masterpieces of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven.

For four decades, Four Nations has developed a leading presence on the early music scene in New York and across the country. Four Nations has performed at major houses and on prestigious series throughout the United States including The Kennedy Center and Lincoln Center. Of special interest is Four Nations' resident ensemble status for both the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, MA and the Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford, CT. where the rich holdings of the two art collections and the brilliant curatorial staffs are an inspiration for music programming.

The Four Nations Ensemble takes its name from one of France's most extraordinary institutions. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Louis XIV and Mazarin, in order to establish a centralized bureau for the arts to reflect the glory of Versailles and Paris in this golden age, created The College of Four Nations.

Soprano Sherezade Panthaki's international success has been fueled by superbly honed musicianship. Described as having "a full, luxuriously toned upper range" (Los Angeles Times) and a vocal color "combining brilliance with a dark, plum-like tone" (The Wall Street Journal), Panthaki is an acknowledged star in the early-music field.

An active and passionate music educator, Ms. Panthaki is frequently called upon to present vocal masterclasses at Universities and Arts Schools across the United States; most recently to students from Houston Grand Opera, Rice University's Moore School of Music, and the University of Texas School of Music. During her 2016-17 season, she served as the Christoph Wolff Visiting Performer at the Harvard University Department of Music. Ms. Panthaki has served as Vocal Coach for the Yale Baroque Opera Project, and currently teaches voice lessons to scholarship winners of the top undergraduate and graduate choral ensembles at Yale University.

Born and raised in India, Ms. Panthaki began her musical education at an early age. Following intensive study as a young pianist, she turned to singing. She holds an Artist Diploma with top honors from the Yale School of Music and the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, where she was the winner of multiple awards including the prestigious Phyllis Curtin Career Entry Prize. She earned a Masters degree from the University of Illinois, and a Bachelors degree from West Virginia Wesleyan College.

Mary Tavener Holmes is from Fort Worth, Texas. She holds a Ph.D. from the Institute of Fine Arts, NYU, with a specialty in Baroque and Rococo European Art. She is a teacher, curator and author in the field for over thirty years.

Her publications include A Magic Mirror: The Portrait in France from 1700 to 1900 with George T.M. Shackelford, Eighteenth-Century French Drawings in New York Collections with Perrin Stein to accompany an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Nicolas Lancret 1690-1743 to accompany an exhibition at The Frick Collection, Französische Gemälde I on the collection of Frederic the Great of Prussia with Christoph Vogtherr, et al, and three non-fiction illustrated children's books. She lives in New York city, has three children, and 2 cats.

ASPECT Foundation for Music and Arts was founded by Irina Knaster in London in 2011 and relocated to New York City in 2016. ASPECT presents a new concert format - one that transforms the traditional recital into an intimate, engaging, and thought-provoking blend of performance, speech, and image.

The Foundation's chamber-music events feature some of today's leading musicians and music experts. For each concert, they set the works on the program in context with presentations supported by visuals. These "illustrated talks" reveal fascinating details about the composer, the music, and the cultural history of the period in question.

ASPECT aims both to support and promote artists, and to welcome audiences old and new to explore new aspects of a classical repertoire of endless riches. It's more than a concert. To find out more, please visit www.aspectfoundation.net.