Renaissance Glory - A Concert of Music for the Christmas Season with the Festival Consort

As the temperature falls and we head toward Christmas, the Festival Consort once again offers its favorite Yuletide songs and instrumental works—some by serious composers of the middle ages and renaissance, and some by writers of carols and folk songs.

The performers are: soprano Carol Menke, countertenor Chris Fritzsche, and instrumentalists Joanna Bramel Young, David Hogan Smith, Alan Paul and Robert Cronin.

$15 at the door or through brownpapertickets.com
For information, call (707) 528-6370

December 17, 2011 - 3 pm

December 3, 2011 - 3 pm - St. Patrick's Church, Kenwood

The Festival Consort plays an impressive array of authentic replicas of Renaissance instruments, including recorders, crumhorns, shawms, curtal, racket, schreyerpfeiffen and gittern. The crumhorns and schreyerpfeiffen are double reed instruments, but the reed is enclosed in a cap, through which the player blows. The shawms, curtal and racket have exposed reeds -- like the oboe and bassoon. The sackbut is a renaissance version of the trombone -- little changed from its modern counterpart. The gittern is a small renaissance guitar.

Two members of the Festival Consort are internationally known as makers of instruments and reeds—David Hogan Smith and Robert Cronin.

The Festival Consort was formed in 1976, and has toured the United States for Community Concerts, sponsored by Columbia Artists. The group performs concerts, and plays for weddings and other festive events throughout the Bay Area. They were members of the Queen's Band at the Renaissance Pleasure Faire for many years.