Welcome to All The Pleasures!

Ensemble L'Harmonie des saisons and the Burlington Baroque Festival Chorus open the 2025 Festival in Grand Style, featuring two of England's greatest composers, Henry Purcell and Georg Friedrich Handel. They both wrote extraordinary theater pieces to celebrate St. Cecilia Day, honoring Cecilia, the Patron Saint of Music. These exquisitely creative works for soloists, chorus and orchestra are among the composer's most popular works, and continually delight audiences world-wide to this day. Presented also will be Henry Purcell's monumental anthem "Rejoice in the Lord Alway" for chorus and instruments, and the Chaconne from Purcell's "King Arthur." 

With the BURLINGTON BAROQUE FESTIVAL SINGERS.

Featured soloists are:

 Helene Brunet, soprano (Quebec City) 

 Nicholas Burns, alto (Vancouver)

 Philippe Gagné, tenor (Montreal)   

Sumner Thompson, baritone (Boston)

 William Kraushaar, bass (Montreal)

The strings of artists-in-residence Ensemble L'Harmonie des saisons are joined by Soprano Helene Brunet in presenting Antonio Vivaldi's most popular concertos, known as The Four Seasons, as well as some of Vivaldi's most virtuostic and dramatic concert arias. The Seasons features four different distinguished violin soloists from the ranks of the ensemble, showcasing each of their musical personalities and brilliant techniques in an amazing display of Baroque brilliance. Featured soloists are:

Julia Wedman, baroque violin (Toronto) 

Adrian Post, baroque violin (Boston

Jessy Dubé, baroque violin (Montreal) 

 Jimin Dobson, baroque violin (Sackville, New Brunswick)

Helene Brunet, soprano (Quebec City)

  Johann Sebastian Bach was the composer of some the most enduring and cherished musical repertoire in Western Music. It is possible to lose sight of the fact that he was for most of his life nothing more glamorous than Director of Music (Cantor) at Lutheran churches in and around Leipzig, and spent his entire career in an area roughly the geographic size of northern Vermont. How then that his work has put him among the greatest and most performed composers of all time? Come to hear two of his greatest Cantatas (sacred works for voices and orchestra) plus two of his most famous instrumental concertos, and be reminded why he will always remain at the top our list!

Concerto for Oboe and Violin in C minor  

Cantata #30: Rejoice, Redeemed People!

Concerto for Two Violins in D minor  

Cantata #147 Heart and Mouth, Deed and Life (Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring)

The Royals of every nation, kingdom and principality in Europe competed for unprecedented grandeur in their Palaces, Chapels and Gardens, which resulted in the Palace and Chapel at Versailles, the suburban Parisian home of French Royalty and Nobility throughout the 17th and 18th centuries. Music in the court and the chapel was, of course, a part of the Olympian ostentation, and the finest composers and performers in the Kingdom served at the pleasure of the royal families. The resultant colossal repertory of Operas, Grand Motets and Chamber Music has proven to be some of the most stunningly beautiful music ever heard, before or since. We offer a brilliant sampling by some of the greatest composers in the employ of Louis XIV, the Sun King himself. With the BURLINGTON BAROQUE FESTIVAL SINGERS, and the Burlington Baroque full orchestra: strings, flutes, oboes, bassoons, trumpets, tympani, organ and harpsichord, all in baroque period instrument splendor!

Richard Delalande: The Fountains of Versailles for orchestra

Marin Marais: Chaconne from his opera Semele for orchestra

Marc - Antoine Charpentier: Grand Motet - Magnificat

Marc - Antoine Charpentier: Grand Motet - Te deum

Helene Brunet, soprano (Quebec City)  

Len Torrie, soprano (Montreal)

Nicholas Burns, alto (Vancouver)  

Ryan Matos, tenor (Burlington)

Philippe Gagné, tenor (Montreal) 

Sumner Thompson, baritone (Boston)
William Kraushaar, bass (Montreal)