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Recorder and Viol Workshop: Faculty
“Not only is their individual
virtuosity impressive, but their strength is their incredibly precise ensemble
playing, where rhythms and phrasing are perfectly timed”. (Jyske Vestkysten, Denmark 2008)
Wood’N’Flutes’ repertoire spans over 900 years, calling for recorders of all
different sizes and historical types. The trio creates a dynamic experience of
aural and visual beauty. They break down the traditional barriers between the
performer and the audience by creatively using the performance space… inviting
the listeners in and including them in their musical experience. Their eclectic
programming appeals to audiences of all ages and interests.
Founded in Copenhagen in 1999, Wood’N’Flutes (Vicki Boeckman, Pia Brinch Jensen, and
Gertie Johnsson) has performed all over
Denmark, and in Germany
and the USA. They
captivate audiences wherever they go with their unique mixture
of virtuosity, grace and charm.
Vicki has chosen to reside in
Seattle
after 23 years of performing and teaching in Denmark, but the group is determined to
continue playing together in spite of the challenges of geography. The trio made
its American debut in 2003, and returned by popular demand to several of the
venues in March 2005 and again in October 2007.
For three consecutive years, Wood’N’Flutes, in collaboration with harpist, Tine
Rehling, was chosen as one of the Danish state ensembles to perform for grades K
- 6 as a part of the Educational Outreach Program. (Levende Musik i Skolerne).
They adore performing for children and have written several short musical
theatre pieces with interactive parts for children and their parents.
Wood’N’Flutes
takes great pride in including works by Danish composers in their repertoire.
They have commissioned and premiered several works to this end. Their 2nd CD,
Woodworks, with contemporary works by
Danish composers, was nominated for a Danish grammy in the category of
contemporary chamber music recordings.
The trio’s first CD, Journey,
recorded on the Kadanza lable, has received critical acclaim in Europe and the United States.
“It can hardly be done any better!”
(Danish Music Times, 2008)
“The album opens the listeners ears for the recorder’s unknown spectrum of sound
possibilities, and it is a memorable experience. (Flensborg Avis, Germany)
Vicki Boeckman
has performed as soloist
and chamber musician throughout the United States, Scandinavia, England,
Scotland and Germany.
Vicki resided in Denmark from 1981-2004. While there she taught at the Royal
Danish Academy of Music in Copenhagen, and at the Ishøj Municipal School of
Music. Since relocating to the United States and settling in Seattle in 2004,
she has been a featured soloist with the Seattle Baroque Orchestra, the
Philharmonia Northwest Orchestra and is a returning guest with the Gallery
Concerts Series, The Northwest Girl Choir, and the Medieval Women’s Choir. She is a sought- after teacher of
recorder and related performance practices in workshops around the country,
actively involved in the Seattle Recorder Society, and is the Music Director for
the newly formed Portland Recorder Society. Vicki teaches children and adults of
all ages and abilities both in her private studio and at the Music Center of the
Northwest in Seattle. Her recordings can be heard on the Kontra Punkt, Classico,
Da Capo, Horizon, Musical Heritage America, Paula, Kadanza, and Primavera
labels.
Pia Brinch Jensen graduated with excellence in
performance from the Royal Academy of Music in
Copenhagen
where she studied with Dan Laurin and Vicki Boeckman. She continued her studies
in Europe and Israel by
participating in master classes and workshops taught by some of Europe’s leading recorder artists and performers of historical
music. In 1997 Pia was one of the
five finalists in the “Moeck Solo Recorder Playing Competition” held in
London.
Pia is currently on the faculty of the Royal Academy of Music in
Copenhagen where she teaches pedagogy. She is also on
the faculty of the Køge Municipal School of Music where she teaches children of
all ages, and young adults in a special program preparing to study at a music
academy.
Pia is also a member of the highly acclaimed recorder quartet Sirena. She has
performed throughout Scandinavia with
Wood’N’Flutes, Sirena and various other ensembles . She has recorded for several
CD labels and performed on radio and television programs in Denmark.
In 1999 Pia co-founded the recorder trio Wood’N’Flutes with Vicki Boeckman and
Gertie Johnsson. The group established itself as one of the mainstream Danish
ensembles with countless performances, radio and TV productions, and two CDs.
Gertie Johnsson
holds recorder degrees from The
Royal Academy of Music in Copenhagen, Denmark, The Royal Academy in the
Hague, Holland, and The Early Music
Institute at Indiana
University. She studied with Eva
Legêne, Ricardo Kanji and Dan Laurin. While at Bloomington
she also studied voice with Paul Elliot and upon returning to Denmark earned a degree
in voice performance and voice pedagogy.
Gertie has performed in Europe, the United States,
Israel and Brazil with various
ensembles, both on the recorder and the cornetto. She is a member of the
Dutch-based internationally acclaimed ensemble, Fala Música, which concentrates
solely on researching and performing music from the 14th and 15th centuries.
They have been featured on numerous radio and TV broadcasts all over
Europe.
Gertie was assistant professor
in recorder at The Early Music Institute at Indiana
University and has taught at various workshops
and music schools in Denmark
and Brazil.
She has served on the board of directors of the Copenhagen Early Music
Festivals, and has recorded on several Danish labels including Kadanza and
Helikon.
Over the last five years Gertie has also successfully produced a number of
theater concerts, following her dream to interweave the artistry of stage and
musical performance.
Besides her active career in early music and staying busy raising her three
children, she is an enthusiastic story teller, writer of prose, and a creator of
curious cartoons.
________________________________________________________________________________
Mary Springfels
(Viols)is a highly
respected performer, professor, and director of early music programs. She has been Musician-in-Residence at
the Newberry Library since 1982 and is the founder and director of the Newberry
Consort. A veteran of the Early Music Movement in America, she has performed and
recorded extensively with such ensembles as the NY Pro Musica, The Waverly
Consort, Concert Royal, Sequentia, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, the Seattle
Baroque Orchestra, Music of the Baroque, Musica Sacra, the Marlborough Festival,
the New York City Opera, and Chicago Opera Theater, where she also serves as an
artistic advisor. In Chicago, Ms Springfels is on the faculty at
Northwestern University, and has taught at Duke University, the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Chicago, and the Northwestern
University School of Music. She is often on the faculty of the San Francisco,
Madison, and Amherst Early Music Festivals, and the Conclave of the Viola da
Gamba Society of America. She can be
heard on over 20 recordings, 9 of which are on the Harmonia Mundi label. She has studied with New York Pro
Musica’s Judith Davidoff and with Dutch Baroque gambist Wieland Kuijken.
Dale Taylor studied early
performance practice at the
University
of Miami, where he worked
under Arnold Grayson in the Collegium Musicum. He then studied recorder
privately with Phil Levin and Bernard Krainis, attended the Oberlin College
Baroque Performance Institute twice, and worked as Supervisor of Levin
Historical Instruments for five years, building quality hand made reproductions
of renaissance and baroque woodwinds including recorders, traversi, cornetti,
bassoons, shawms, rankets and clarinets. He restored early woodwinds for
New York’s Center for Musical
Antiquities. Subsequently he has been in demand to repair instruments on his
own. In the late 70s he ran the national office of the American Recorder
Society. He is now in El Paso, where he is President of Music Forum El Paso and
is active in the local chapter of the ARS and as a teacher.
He has also spent
considerable time working in living history museums, where he acquired a
broad-based knowledge of the social history of the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries, which he uses to inform his understanding of early musical thought.
He has studied the way in which period acoustics influenced musical performance
style. He was the featured woodwind turner at
Southstreet Seaport
Museum’s musical district tours.
Dale wrote
Writer’s Digest Books’ Writer’s Guide to Everyday Life in Colonial America,
1607-1783, and Putting Recorders and their Players to the Test which appeared in
the November 2000 American Recorder. He read Occurrences of European
Double Reed Instruments in the New World to 1815: A Survey at the 1986 annual
meeting of the American Musical Instrument Society, and he wrote A Bird
Fancier’s Delight which appeared in Early American Life in February of
1986. He recently began to self-publish a variety of music for recorders and
early double reeds.
Dale has performed in the Victoria Bach Festival,
Mercury Baroque, I Solisti da Camera, Capriole, the Cooke-Taylor Duo, the
Governor’s Music, the Locrian Consort, Musick’s Monument, Texas Early Music
Project, Passing Measures / Passing Fancies, the Virginia Pro Musica and in ad
hoc chamber ensembles with personnel from the NY Philharmonic, NJ Symphony,
Philadelphia Orchestra, Smithsonian Chamber Players, Vienna Boy’s Choir and the
NY City Opera. His solo performances include numerous sonata performances,
Bach’s Fourth Brandenburg Concerto, the solo part in Britten’s Noye’s Fludde and
parts in several Bach cantatas. He has appeared on Public Television, recorded a
L’Oreal commercial, appeared at the Houston Revels and Texas Renaissance
Festival and been Music Director for the Virginia Shakespeare Festival.
He has taught at the “Texas Toot”, Rio Grande,
NM, Denver CO “Rocky”, Little Rock, AR, Birmingham, AL, Gainesville, FL and
Providence, RI, Chapter’s American Recorder Society workshops, led meetings of
the Southern California, Austin, TX, Phoenix, AZ, New Orleans, LA, West
Suburban, IL, Albuquerque, Rio Grande and Santa Fe, NM, Denver, CO, Bergen
County, Navesink, North Jersey, Princeton and Somerset Hills, NJ, the Virginia
Beach and Williamsburg. VA, Greater New York, NY and
Philadelphia, PA Chapters of the
American Recorder Society, privately and through Young Audiences. He is an ARS
certified teacher and has guest lectured at University of Texas,
El Paso and
Texas A&M
University.
Carol Redman
(Baroque Flute)
is the principal
flutist for Santa Fe Pro Musica. She has performed on modern flute and baroque
flute at music festivals and concert series across North America, including Le
Domaine Forget Music Festival (Canada), Smithsonian Chamber Music Society,
Vancouver Early Music Festival, Oregon Bach Festival, San Luis Obispo Mozart
Festival, Colorado Chamber Players, Colorado Opera Troupe, Maryland Handel
Festival, Bravo! Vail Valley Music Festival, Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival,
and festivals in Germany and Japan, among others. She has recorded on the Koch,
Dorian, and Sono Luminus labels, and received a 2008 Grammy Nomination for Best
Classical Music/Small Ensemble. She is a former member of the Santa Fe Opera
Orchestra and the New Mexico Symphony Orchestra. Ms Redman is a magna cum laude
graduate from the University of New Mexico with a Bachelor of Music degree in
performance. In addition to her performance activities, she teaches flute
students of all ages and directs the Santa Fe Flute Choir.