Handel’s Theodora

Saturday, March 29, 2025 at 6PM CT
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

Handel’s final masterpiece tells the story of Theodora, an early Christian martyr, who is persecuted by a corrupt and wicked Roman president. Bacchanal and piety compete in this deeply moving oratorio, which features five soloists, chorus, and orchestra. Its central message, that faith triumphs over death, is common across religious traditions.

Classical Collaborations

Friday, May 23, 2025 at 7:30PM CT
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

Classical Collaborations brings together the central genres of the Viennese classical “school”—concerto, sonata, symphony, and variations—while foregrounding the contributions of women to this fabled musical culture. Featured works include Marianna Martines’s Concerto in G Major for Fortepiano and Orchestra, Mozart’s “Auernhammer” Sonata in F Major (K. 376), Joseph Haydn’s Symphony No. 48 (“Maria Theresia”), and Josepha Auernhammer’s “Papageno Variations.”

In Praise of Virtue

Friday, September 20, 2024 at 7:30 PM CT
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

In Praise of Virtue features soprano Hannah DePriest and countertenor Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen in two rarely heard solo cantatas: J. S. Bach’s beautifully reflective Ich bin vergnügt (BWV 84) and G. F. Handel’s glittering Splenda l’alba in oriente (HWV 166). Excerpts from Johann Adolph Hasse’s Marc-Antonio e Cleopatra set this noble love story with luscious melodies and spectacular virtuosity, in arias and duets for both soloists.

Madrigals of Love and War

Friday, November 8, 2024 at 7:30 PM CT
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

Claudio Monteverdi’s Madrigals of Love and War transformed a venerable genre—the Renaissance part song—into dramatic scenes that rival the flamboyant art of Caravaggio or Bernini. By updating an old musical form, Monteverdi created a repertoire that is both timeless and singular: few madrigals from any age hold a candle to these masterworks for multiple voices and instruments.

Fallen Angels

September 22, 2023
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

Fallen Angels highlights the paranormal in Baroque music, from Giacomo Carissimi’s harrowing Judgement of Solomon to spirited masques from Henry Purcell’s Fairy Queen. With five extraordinary singers and a colorful Baroque orchestra of period strings and winds, this otherworldly program inaugurates an entire season devoted to musical magic of various kinds.

Ecstatic Visions

November 3, 2023
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

Handel’s Silete venti, the major work on this program, is a spectacular solo motet for soprano and Baroque orchestra, one that rivals his best operatic scenes. It places a deeply religious soul within a naturalistic context, where rustling leaves and blooming flowers prompt a lush meditation on love and happiness. Ecstatic Visions spotlights members of the ensemble as well, in rapturous instrumental music by Johann Joseph Fux, Johann Schmeltzer, Jean-Philippe Rameau, and more.

Fugal Games

January 13, 2024
Duncan Recital Hall, Rice University

Fugal Games takes up an enigmatic though quintessentially Baroque mode of music-making while celebrating the release of artistic director Matthew Dirst’s new book on Bach’s Art of Fugue and Musical Offering, the composer’s ultimate demonstrations of learned counterpoint. With significant excerpts from both works, this program also supplies context in the form of miniature marvels by George Philipp Telemann.

Visions & Reveries

March 16, 2024
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

Visions and Reveries showcases a select ensemble of period-instrument specialists and one of our favorite singers in an all-French program. Its delectable prix-fixe menu includes lyric cantatas on mythological themes by Elizabeth Claude Jacquet de la Guerre and Jean-Philippe Rameau, whose contributions to the genre elevate it to high art, and a sumptuous instrumental suite by François Couperin.

Amadigi di Gaula

May 25, 2024
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

The most ambitious undertaking of our 2023/24 season is a new production of Handel’s Amadigi di Gaula, one of a handful of “magic” operas he produced during his long career in London. Our cast includes four rising stars of the operatic firmament, all ideally suited to this exceptionally beautiful score. Tara Faircloth directs and Matthew Dirst conducts this Houston premiere.

Hail, Bright Cecilia!

September 23, 2022
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

The patron saint of the “celestial art” of music, the legendary Cecilia has inspired countless poets, composers, and musical organizations over the years. Our harmonious season opener spotlights two splendid Cecilian odes by Henry Purcell for multiple voices and a colorful Baroque orchestra of period strings, winds, keyboards, lutes, and percussion.

Red Priest of Venice

November 12, 2022
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

This virtuosic tribute to Antonio Vivaldi, the famous “Red Priest” of Venice, features breathtaking concerti from this pioneer of the genre, colorful arias from a 1735 operatic pastiche, and his beloved setting of the Stabat Mater for solo voice and strings.

Clori, Tirsi, e Fileno

March 26, 2023
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

A delightful musical romp, Handel's Clori, Tirsi e Fileno includes spectacular arias that the composer later borrowed for his Italian operas. A cast of young operatic stars, all singing en travesti as the opposite gender, brings a new twist to this timeless story of a wily shepherdess and her two suitors.

Songs of Zion

May 13, 2023
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

From the rich legacy of psalm settings, our season finale juxtaposes music from the Jewish and Christian traditions. In convertendo (Psalm 126) from the operatic master Jean-Philippe Rameau infuses the psalmist's words with flair and passion, while companion pieces by Salamone Rossi and J. S. Bach infuse psalm texts with sonorous counterpoint.

Bach, Handel, and Hercules

September 24, 2021
Zilkha Hall, The Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

Ars Lyrica returns to the Hobby Center with a morality tale set to music by both Bach and Handel. The iconic strongman Hercules earned his place in the pantheon not through conquests but rather for his wisdom and honor. A pillar of mythology since Antiquity, Hercules faces a familiar dilemma, one that found significant resonance in the Baroque era, when ancient stories were a principal source of moral instruction. Both composers treat Hercules’ temptation and ultimate embrace of virtue with ravishing arias and grand ensembles.

An Uncommon Chevalier

March 27, 2022
Zilkha Hall, Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

An accomplished composer, violinist, conductor, fencer, and dancer, Joseph de Bologne became the toast of Paris in the early 1770s. The son of a plantation owner and an African slave, the younger mixed-race Bologne acquired the title Chevalier de Saint-Georges thanks to Louis XV, in whose personal guard he briefly served, and eventually became a favorite of Marie Antoinette. The program features a tuneful violin concerto from Saint-Georges, a comparable work from a contemporary, and a symphony commissioned by the Chevalier.

Dido and Aeneas

May 21, 2022
Zilkha Hall, Hobby Center for the Performing Arts

The 2021/22 Ars Lyrica season concludes with a new production of the first masterpiece of English opera. Henry Purcell, early modern England’s greatest musical dramatist, infused his chosen texts with both beauty and pathos. His Dido and Aeneas is a miracle of operatic economy, with lively dancing, memorable choruses, and at its center a noble heroine who loves too well: her demise is both tragic and transcendent.