Newberry Consort Presents Music Inspired by Artist Tintoretto 4/12-14

CHICAGO — This spring, The Newberry Consort invites audiences to go back in time to 16th century Italy to experience the gorgeous music and art that bloomed during the Italian Renaissance in “Il Furioso! Music Influenced by the Art and Life of Jacopo Tintoretto,” taking place April 12-14 in downtown Chicago, Hyde Park and Evanston. Tickets range from $25 to $65, and are $10 for students with a valid student ID.

Developed in conjunction with the early music group Incantare, an ensemble of sackbuts, violins, and organ, “Il Furioso!” focuses on the life and times of Venetian artist Jacopo Robusti, known as “Il Tintoretto,” and his daughter, Marietta Robusti. Tintoretto, one of the most famous artists of the Italian Renaissance, is most well known for creating large-scale, dramatic works that fill the halls and ceilings of palaces and churches in Venice. One of his most famous paintings, Il paradiso, can still be seen in the Doge’s palace, and is one of the largest paintings on canvas in the world.

Singers Matthew Dean and Allison Selby Cook will narrate the program through a spoken fictional dialogo — a traditional Italian rhetorical dialogue — between Tintoretto and Robusti, who was also an artist and musician. Through Robusti’s questions and her father’s answers, the audience will learn about the music, imagery, and lives of artists and musicians in Renaissance Venice.

The program is particularly special to Liza Malamut, artistic director of The Newberry Consort, who is also a founding member of Incantare. “This program was long in the making,” said Malamut, “but the initial inspiration came from a life-changing Tintoretto exhibit where one of our sackbut players, Ben David Aronson, recognized that these astounding paintings overlap with the colors and contrasts of the music from the time. The collaboration of the two ensembles allows us to truly bring this grandiose music to life.”

Audience members will also get to see projections of paintings by Tintoretto, Robusti, and other Venetian artists such as Titian, Veronese, Bellini, and Bassano, while hearing music inspired by the paintings and written by their composer contemporaries including Andrea Gabrieli, Gioseffo Zarlino, Nicola Vicentino, Leonora Orsina, Madalena Casulana, Diego Ortiz, and more.

“This concert will feature a trifecta of art, music, and theater, so I think there is something here for everyone,” said Malamut.

This visually and aurally sumptuous program will feature a mixture of opulent Venetian works for brass, strings, and voices, including intimate improvisatory solos, sparkling Italian dances, and lush polychoral works that mirror the richly hued textures of the paintings and evoke the splendor of Renaissance Venice.

In addition to singers Dean and Cook, the program will also feature three other singers — soprano Hannah DePriest, bass Daniel Fridley, and renowned countertenor Reginald Mobley — as well as Brandon Acker on lute, Kiri Tollaksen on cornetto, Craig Trompeter on viola de gamba, and Malamut on sackbut. Incantare musicians Alice Culin-Ellison and Evan Few join the ensemble on violins, with Ben David Aronson and Garrett Lahr on sackbuts and Naomi Gregory on organ and harpsichord.

Event Details

Il Furioso! Music Influenced by the Life and Art of Jacopo Tintoretto

Friday, April 12 at 7:30 p.m. at Ganz Hall, Roosevelt University, 430 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago

Saturday, April 13 at 7:30 p.m. at Hyde Park Union Church, 5600 S. Woodlawn Ave., Chicago

Sunday, April 14 at 4 p.m. at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, 939 Hinman Ave., Evanston

Tickets: $25, $45, $65 for preferred seating, $10 for students with a valid student ID.

To purchase tickets please visit www.newberryconsort.org.

About the Newberry Consort:

The Newberry Consort brings together singers and instrumentalists of the highest caliber to create historically informed performances of music from the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the Baroque, and beyond. By integrating historical performance and research with contemporary themes and multimedia, we inspire audiences, musicians, and scholars by providing a window into earlier times and diverse cultures. The Consort continues to uplift Chicago’s early music community through mentorships, teaching, and engagement of local artists.