YARMOUTH, N.S. — He’s been described as:"Genre-bending" (National Post), "intrepid" (Globe and Mail), "profound" (The WholeNote) and "freaky good" (The Gazette). Violinist Mark Fewer joins one of Canada’s finest early music specialists, harpsichordist Hank Knox to showcase sonatas by Vivaldi and Bach in a concert at Holy Trinity Church, 61 William St., Yarmouth on Tuesday, June 25 at 7 p.m. The concert is one stop on a Musique Royale tour throughout Nova Scotia. Advance tickets are $20, $25 at the door. Call (902) 742-8765 or email for tickets.
Known for his exceptional versatility, violinist Mark Fewer is a Juno and Prix Opus winner, has been a featured guest with Stevie Wonder and his band, and is the new artistic director of Stratford Summer Music. His performance career has seen him tour worldwide. He has performed in some of the world’s most celebrated music halls, including Wigmore and Carnegie halls. He has been featured as soloist with dozens of symphony orchestras including Melbourne, San Francisco, Vancouver and Toronto. He is a member of the Smithsonian Chamber Players, which performs and records on priceless decorated Stradivari instruments, and is also founding artistic director of the SweetWater Music Festival which champions instruments made by Canadian luthiers. Fewer has held the positions of William Dawson Scholar at the Schulich School of Music of McGill University, Artist-in-Residence at Stanford University and currently is Associate Professor at the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto.
Hailed internationally for his “colorful, kinetic performances,” Hank Knox performs on harpsichord in concert halls, churches, museums, galleries and homes around the globe. A founding member of Montreal’s Arion Baroque Orchestra, with whom he has toured North and South America, Europe and Japan, Knox also regularly performs and tours with Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, Les Violons du Roy and l’Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, among other groups, ensembles and orchestras. He has released a number of acclaimed recordings on rare antique instruments as well as copies of historical instruments. He teaches in the Early Music program at McGill University where he conducts the McGill Baroque Orchestra. He has directed a great number of Baroque operas for Opera McGill, including Francesca Caccini’s La liberazione di Ruggiero, Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Monteverdi’s Poppea and Handel’s Agrippina, Giulio Cesare, Alcina and Rinaldo.
The concert in Yarmouth is presented by Hear! Here! Society.
Joan Semple, who chairs Hear! Here!’s Musique Royale committee says the summer music series offers a feast for both ears and eyes.
“Holy Trinity is a perfect fit for this concert and it fulfills Musique Royale’s mandate of marrying great music with historic venues,” she said.
The stained glass windows and soaring ceilings at the church on William Street have been inspiring admiration since it first opened in 1872. It was the fourth Anglican church in Yarmouth, built for a well-established and thriving Anglican community. The church’s design, with its arched ceilings and windows, speaks to a renewed interest in Gothic architecture in vogue around the middle of the 19th century. The squared bell tower still sports clarion bells, which continue to be played both as a call for the faithful and, sometimes, in concert.
But it is the stained glass windows that dominate the eye from inside the sanctuary. These windows are both beautiful and revelatory in the stories they depict.
The concert kicks off Hear! Here!’s eleventh season, which will continue on Sunday, July 7 with an afternoon piano recital with acclaimed pianist Walter Delahunt, who will take a deep dive into works by Bach and Robert Schumann. That concert will take place at Yarmouth County Museum.
