Agave Baroque featuring Reginald Mobley, countertenor

Chamber Music at the Clark concert seating is determined via lottery. The booking-by-lottery entry form for Agave Baroque featuring Reginald Mobley, Countertenor concert seats posts here on Thursday, March 21, 2019. Lottery registration closes Thursday, April 11, 2019.

Learn more about the booking-by-lottery system for securing Chamber Music at the Clark seats.

Agave Baroque

Aaron Westman and Anna Washburn, violin
Andrew McIntosh, viola
William Skeen, violoncello and viola da gamba
Henry Lebedinsky, organ
Kevin Cooper, theorbo
Reginald Mobley, countertenor

“…powerful presence… brilliant… profound playing…”—Early Music America

Agave Baroque is based in the San Francisco Bay Area, and specializes in string chamber music of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The members of the group reside and are active far and wide, and come together from Basel, Boston, Seattle, Fresno, San Francisco, and Marin.

Agave has received numerous awards and accolades and gained local and national attention as “an energized… free spirited group,” as well as for its “rapturous music,” “brilliant… profound playing,” and growing discography. Now in its tenth season, Agave continues its fruitful affiliations with star countertenor Reginald Mobley, InterMusic SF (formerly San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music), and the Sylvestris Quartet. It continues to be a unique and innovative voice in the chamber music community nationally.

During its initial season, Agave was selected by Early Music America to perform in a showcase concert at the Association of Performing Arts Professionals Convention in New York. In 2009, The Museum of Jurassic Technology in Los Angeles commissioned Cold Genius: the music of Henry Purcell, which Agave premiered at the museum in 2010, and subsequently recorded. In 2011 Agave Baroque was one of five finalists in the NAXOS/EMA Recording Competition. In 2012, the San Francisco Early Music Society chose Agave to present a main stage concert at the 2012 Berkeley Early Music Festival. Later in 2012, Agave competed in New York as one of six finalists at the Early Music America Baroque Performance Competition. Agave received a generous grant from the San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music to record Friends of Ferdinand, which VGo Recordings released in 2013. For the 2014–15 season, Agave became an ensemble in residence at the San Francisco Friends  of Chamber Music/Presidio Trust’s concert series,  Presidio Sessions. They also collaborated with Los Angeles new music concert series Jacaranda: music at the edge, and embarked on a Southeastern US tour with Reginald Mobley, which included a residency at University of North Carolina School of the Arts.

In 2015, Agave released Queen of Heaven: Music of Isabella Leonarda, their first album with Mr. Mobley. In 2016, Mr. Mobley and Agave collaborated on a second album, Peace in Our Time, whose February, 2018 release marked the 400th anniversary of the start of the Thirty Years’ War, when conflict and the Plague ravaged much of Europe.

Agave Baroque has performed to sold-out crowds throughout the Bay Area, including at Barefoot Chamber Concerts, SF Music Day, Chattanooga Chamber Music, Noe Valley Chamber Music, Old First Concerts, Sonoma Bach, Presidio Sessions, MSRI, San Francisco Early Music Society, and Trinity Chamber Concerts, as well as at Bitterroot Baroque (Montana), Fresno City College, Fresno Pacific University, the Museum of Jurassic Technology, Music at St. Albans (NC), Jacaranda (Los Angeles), Arizona Early Music Society, Pacific Music Works Underground, Seattle Early Music Guild, University of North Carolina School of the Arts, Appalachian State University, and the Berkeley Early Music Festival. On-air appearances include KPFK Pacifica Radio in Los Angeles, KALW (SF), WDAV (North Carolina), New Mexico Public Radio, as well as several features on NPR’s Harmonia early music radio program. Agave Baroque has also presented two programs to groups of K-12 educators as part of the San Francisco Symphony’s “Keeping Score” program.

www.agavebaroque.org

Agave Baroque is represented by Seth Cooper Arts: www.sethcooperarts.com

Reginald Mobley, countertenor

“a young countertenor destined to make his mark in the early music world”—Chicago Tribune

Noted for his “crystalline diction and pure, evenly produced tone” (Miami Herald), as well as an “elaborate and inventive ornamentation” (South Florida Classical Review), countertenor Reginald Mobley is highly sought after for baroque, classical, and modern repertoire.

Past performances of note include the premier of a reconstruction of Bach’s Markus-Passion at the Oregon Bach Festival, devised and led by Matthew Halls, a premiere of Eric Banks’ Aluta continua: the passion of David Kato Kisule with Coro Allegro, concerts of Bach’s Easter Oratorio and Lully’s Te Deum with Bach Collegium San Diego, and an extensive tour of sixteen concerts around Europe singing Bach’s Matthäus-Passion with the Monteverdi Choir’s English Baroque Soloists led by Sir John Eliot Gardiner.

The 2016–2017 season included a tour and recording of Bach’s Magnificat with Sir John Eliot Gardiner, concerts of Handel’s Messiah with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra, several performances with the Seattle Symphony and Calgary Philharmonic Orchestras, as well as an innovative project with the Academy of Ancient Music entitled Bach Reconstructed. The 2018–19 season marks Mobley’s debut with the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra in San Francisco.

http://www.reginaldmobley.com

Reginald Mobley is represented by CLB Management: https://www.clbmanagement.co.uk/

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Program

Johann Michael Bach (1648–1694)
Sonata and Capriccio in G Minor

Johann Bernhard Bach (1676–1749)
Suite No. 1 in G minor (partial)

Overture

Philipp Heinrich Erlebach (1657–1714)
“Trocknet Euch Ihr heißen Zähren”

Heinrich Bach (1615–1692)
Chorale prelude, “Erbarm dich mein, O Herre Gott”

Johann Rosenmüller (1619–1684)
Christum ducem, qui per crucem

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
Sonata for Violin and Continuo in G Major, BWV 1021

Adagio
Vivace
Largo
Presto

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
Quoniam, Lutheran Mass in F, BWV 233

Intermission

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
(after G.H. Stölzel)
“Bekennen will ich seinen Namen,” Bekennen will ich seinen Namen, BWV 200

Johann Bernhard Bach (1676–1749)
Suite No. 1 in G minor (partial, continued)

Air
Fantaisie
Passepied

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
“Mit allem, was ich hab und bin,” Alles nur nach Gottes Willen, BWV 72

Johann Christoph Bach (1642–1703)
Ciaconna: “Mein Freund ist Mein,” Meine Freundin, du bist schön

Johann Christoph Bach (1642–1703)
“Es ist nun aus mit meinem leben”

Reception