Vancouver Early Music Festival emphasizes its show will go on despite suspension of MusicFest Vancouver

"Early Music Vancouver is saddened by the recent news that MusicFest Vancouver (formerly Festival Vancouver) has suspended operations. Since this festival’s inception in 2000, Early Music Vancouver has enjoyed a mutually beneficial partnership with, and played a major role in its offerings. Early Music Vancouver has successfully self-produced many major annual events at the Chan Centre for presentation as part of MusicFest, offering critically acclaimed performances of two fully-staged Monteverdi operas (Orfeo and The Coronation of Poppea) as well as stunning large-scale concert performances of Monteverdi's Vespers, Caldara’s Clodoveo, Rameau’s Pygmalion, Purcell’s Faerie Queene and King Arthur and Handel’s Resurrezione and Orlando.

"Although the regrettable suspension of MusicFest Vancouver will have an impact on Early Music Vancouver, the future of the Vancouver Early Music Festival is secure and we look forward to the next exciting edition that will take place from July 28 through August 17, 2013.

"The 2013 centrepiece production at the Chan Centre will be Handel’s Israel in Egypt with an all-star cast of internationally renowned soloists and the Early Music Vancouver Baroque Festival Orchestra and Chorus directed by Alexander Weimann. This year's festival will also see the return of the world-renowned Paris-based mediaeval ensemble Sequentia with a new programme centred around the original Carmina Burana, Les Voix Baroques in a part-song programme celebrating the 450th anniversary of John Dowland and a programme of sacred music from the early German Baroque, recitals by soprano Ellen Hargis and by lutenist Robert Barto, as well as other concerts featuring early music of the renaissance, baroque and other non-western traditions.

Details for the 2013 Vancouver Early Music Festival will be available in the coming months at www.earlymusic.bc.ca/.