27 period instrument ensembles will receive funds to pursue concert and recording projects with audience growth and community building at their heart
The Continuo Foundation has announced its latest round of grants, distributing £100,000 of funding to 27 period instrument ensembles across the UK.
The Continuo Foundation is dedicated to supporting period instrument ensembles and to bringing live early music to communities across the UK since its founding in 2020. The latest round of grants brings the amount provided for historical performance projects covering 900 years of history to a total of £850,000.
The ensembles are: Apollo’s Cabinet, Azur Ensemble, Baroque In The North, Bloomsbury Players, The Brook Street Band, Ceruleo, Chelys, The Concert Trombone Quartette, Dialogue Viols, Ensemble Augelletti, Ensemble Molière, Ex Cathedra, Fiori Musicali, Florilegium, Istante Collective, Le Foyer des Artistes, Liturina, Londinium Consort, London Obbligato Collective, Lowe Ensemble, Lux Musicae London, Manchester Baroque, Players of the Hampstead Collective, Saraband, Sestina Music, Sounds Historical and Spiritato.
Eight of the groups are receiving funds from Continuo Foundation for the first time, while ten of the cohort are emerging ensembles that have formed since 2020.
Manchester-based trio Baroque in the North displays how community building is central to its project ‘Baroque & Beyond’. Violinist, recorder and musette player Amanda Babington says: ’[The project] takes chamber concerts “beyond” the usual locations, to rural communities in the North West without arts events. The aim is to improve accessibility to live music for rural residents of all ages, and to enhance community spirit by presenting live music events in a venue central to village life, whether it’s a chapel, school or pub.
’Continuo Foundation grants allows small organisations like ours to develop projects like this, and to keep ticket prices affordable.’
Chelys Consort of Viols will be using its grant to commemorate the quatercentenary of the composer Orlando Gibbons’s death. The funding will enable Chelys to present Gibbons’s sacred music as part of a liturgical service, and also in concert with a professional vocal ensemble.
Other highlights include a programme of Gibbons’s secular madrigals with soprano Emily Atkinson, recitals of his consort and keyboard music, talks curated by the Viola da Gamba Society, masterclasses and viewings of original manuscripts in the Christ Church library.
Founder Alison Kinder explains: ’We might have managed the service and perhaps one concert on our own. But to plan and deliver something on such a scale, giving audiences the chance to experience Gibbons’s majestic music in all its forms, would have been impossible without this award.’
Details of the 27 award recipients and their projects are available on the Continuo Foundation website and the Continuo Connect website - a digital platform of event listing, festivals guide, artist profiles, articles and playlists.
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