2026 Salish Sea Early Music Festival on Orcas Island

||| FROM JEFFREY COHEN for SALISH SEA EARLY MUSIC FESTIVAL |||

The 2026 Salish Sea Early Music Festival presents its 15th festival on Orcas Island, consisting this year of 8 diverse programs from the mid-1500’s through three hundred years of chamber music to the time of Beethoven, with prominent early music specialists from Ukraine, Switzerland/Spain, Germany, Montreal, and from coast to coast in the United States and around the Pacific Northwest. Among them are harpsichordists Olena Zhukova (Kyiv), Irene Roldàn (Basel), Elisabeth Wright (Indiana) and Hans-Jürgen Schnoor (Lübeck); soprano Maike Albrecht (Lübeck); viola da gambists (who also play treble viol and pardessus de viol) Susie Napper (Montreal), Mélisande Corriveau (Montreal) and Annalisa Pappano (Munich); baroque guitarist and theorbo players William Simms (Baltimore) and Oleg Timofeyev (Chicago); violinists David Greenberg (Corvalis) and Ethan Lin (Seattle); violist Vicki Gunn (Portland); and baroque bassoonist Anna Marsh (Tacoma).

The Festival, presented in collaboration with Orcas Adventist Fellowship Church, takes place at 5:00 PM from January through early July (please see complete schedule below) at Orcas Adventist Fellowship Church at 107 Enchanted Forest Road in Eastsound on Orcas Island. Admission is by a suggested donation (a free will offering) of $20 to $30. Those 18 & under are free.  All are welcome regardless of donation. For additional information please see  www.salishseafestival.org/orcas.
       
       COMPLETE SCHEDULE for the 2026 Salish Sea Early Music Festival on Orcas Island
       at Orcas Adventist Fellowship Church (all concerts at 5:00 PM):
                                              
 Monday, January 26 at 5:00 PM:
       — LITTLE EVENING CONCERTS for LOUIS XIV
          · Anna Marsh, baroque bassoon
          · Ethan Lin (Seattle), baroque violin
          · Vicki Gunn (Portland) , baroque viola
          · Jeffrey Cohan, baroque flute
A remarkable and almost completely unknown manuscript of 770 pages discovered in Paris by Jeffrey Cohan was prepared in 1713 for the “little evening concerts” for the aging Louis XIV by his long-time music librarian André Danican Philidor l’ainé, who organized and transcribed some of Louis’ favorite music from at least the previous 54 years, for performance by the king’s favorite instrumentalists. Two years before his death in 1715, Louis XIV was anxious to revisit the music of his youth, and Philidor dates some of these selections as far back as 1659, when Louis XIV was 21 and had danced for eight years already in ballet performances at court, most famously as the sun god Apollo. A new selection of 5 of the 67 suites therein will be presented.
       
Tuesday, February 10 at 5:00 PM:
       — BAROQUE IN TRANSITION: The ITALIAN and FRENCH PERSPECTIVE          
          · Susie Napper (Montreal), viola da gamba
          · Olena Zhukova (Kyiv, Ukraine), harpsichord
          · Mélisande Corriveau (Montreal), treble viol & viola da gamba
          · Jeffrey Cohan, renaissance & baroque flutes
Les Voix humaines, the widely celebrated prize-winning duo of viols from Montreal joins us for a program illuminating a radically evolving musical perspective through the 17th century. So-called “Renaissance” and “Baroque” instrumental colors were very much in flux and existed side by side, as did French and Italian stylistic currents, reflecting an evolving musical taste and striking stylistic contrast. Repertoire stemming from the Italian late renaissance canzona tradition contrasts greatly with music evolving at the courts of Louis XIII and XIV, as influenced by the Italian Jean-Baptiste Lully. Later in the century this progression towards the modern sonata brought forth the stunning works of Italian Arcangelo Corelli, which were admired by musicians at the center of the vast musical establishment surrounding Louis XIV.
       
Tuesday, February 24 at 5:00 PM:
       — EUROPEAN TOUR: ITALY, SCOTLAND and UKRAINE            
          · Olena Zhukova (Kyiv, Ukraine), harpsichord
          · Jeffrey Cohan, baroque flute
Our welcomed guest from Kyiv, harpsichordist Olena Zhukova explores in depth with Jeffrey Cohan the wide stylistic European 18th century musical landscape, from Italy through France, Germany, Ukraine and England to Scotland in an excursion through this century of transformation and diversity by decade and culture within the baroque and early classical periods.
       
Tuesday, March 17 at 5:00 PM:
       — FOLK, BAROQUE & BEYOND: HOLLAND (1630), SCOTLAND (1750) & FRANCE (1830)
          · Oleg Timofeyev, English guitar & lute
          · Jeffrey Cohan, renaissance & baroque flutes
The popular psalm tunes of the renaissance, airs of the Scottish baroque and 19th-century opera tunes were all interpreted by prominent composers and performers as illustrated by this completely new and innovative program further traversing unexplored territory in the realm of folk-inspired art music from the Renaissance, Baroque and Romantic periods, performed on plucked instruments and transverse flutes from three centuries, and highlighting collaboration between prominent musicians of these periods.

Lute, a rare but once extremely popular wire-strung English Guitar (London, 1761), and an early 19th-century 7-string guitar (Russia, 1820) are to be heard alongside renaissance, baroque early romantic (London, 1820) flutes with music by flutist Jacob Van Eyck and lutenist Nicolas Vallet, Francesco Barsanti and Turlough O’Carolan, James Oswald, guitarist Louis-Ange Carpentras, flutist Benoit Tranquille Berbiguer, guitarist Ferdinando Carulli and flutist Jean-Louis Tulou.
       
Thursday, April 23 at 5:00 PM:
       — TELEMANN PARIS QUARTETS II
          · David Greenberg (Corvallis), baroque violin
          · Susie Napper (Montreal), viola da gamba
          · Elisabeth Wright (Indiana), harpsichord
          · Jeffrey Cohan, baroque flute
Telemann composed his 12 brilliant “Paris Quartets” in Hamburg and then Paris in response to a request in 1730 from the most famous Parisian flute, violin and cello virtuosi which resulted in his most significant journey away from home during his lifetime. This year we’ll present four new quartets: the first of each of his four sets of quartets in sonata or suite form.
       
Tuesday, May 5 at 5:00 PM:
       — HANDEL & BACH
          · Hans-Jürgen Schnoor (Lübeck, Germany), harpsichord
          · Maike Albrecht (Lübeck, Germany), soprano
          · Susie Napper (Montreal), viola da gamba
          · Jeffrey Cohan, baroque flute
Vocal masterworks by Handel and Bach will include 6 of Handel’s 9 German Arias, selected Bach arias from cantatas, the Italian Concerto for solo harpsichord and Bach’s entire cantata “Ich habe genug”.
       
Wednesday, June 10 at 5:00 PM :
       — JOHANN SEBASTIAN BACH
          · Irene Roldán (Basel, Switzerland), harpsichord
          · Jeffrey Cohan, baroque flute
Irene Roldán was honored with the prestigious Bach Prize and an additional special award at the XXXIII. International Bach Competition held in Leipzig, Germany.                                         
       
Tuesday, June 30 at 5:00 PM:
       — THE FRENCH CONNECTION
          · Annalisa Pappano (Munich, Germany), pardessus de viole
          · Billy Simms, quitar & lute (Baltimore)
          · Jeffrey Cohan, baroque flute
The French royal court musical establishment generated a vast amount of music and is to be represented by works of Jean-Baptiste Lully, Élisabeth Jacquet de La Guerre, Marin Marais, Jacques Hotteterre and others, including music designated for the king’s bedtime, evening concerts and banquets.
       
The Salish Sea Early Music Festival has since 2011 provided world class period instrument performances of chamber music, both familiar and rarely or never before heard in modern times, with musicians from Europe and all around the Puget Sound, the United States and Canada who are among the finest in their field around the globe. Entrance is by donation and the concerts have always been open to all regardless of contribution. The Salish Sea Early Music Festival and is a non-profit 501c3 organization and was granted affiliate status by Early Music America, which develops, strengthens, and celebrates early music and historically informed performance in North America.