Florilegium are pleased to announce that the Arakaendar Bolivia Choir will be touring the UK and Europe during a three-week visit in June/July 2012.

Their concert schedule in the UK will be:

Fri 22 June,19.30; Spitalfields Festival, London (with Florilegium)
box office: 020 7377 1362

Mon 25 June,13.00; St Magnus International Festival, Orkney (with Florilegium)

Tue 26 June, 21.00; St Magnus International Festival, Orkney (with Florilegium)
box office: 01856 871445

Thu 28 June, 19.30; Beaminster Festival (with Florilegium)
box office: 01308 862 943

(Fri 29 June-Wed 4 July – Spain)

Fri 6 July, 13.00; York Early Music Festival (with York University Chamber Choir)

Sat 7 July, 19.30; York Early Music Festival (with Florilegium)
box office: 01904 658338

Sun 8 July, 15.00; Cheltenham Festival (with Florilegium)
box office: 01242 505444

Mon 9 July, 19.30; Royal College of Music, London
box office: 020 7951 4314

Arakaendar Bolivia Choir was founded in December 2005 by Ashley Solomon, to work with Florilegium on their Bolivian Baroque projects. Ashley auditioned over 50 singers, who came from different cities and backgrounds all over Bolivia, and selected a mixed choir of 16 voices.    He then commuted monthly from London to Bolivia to rehearse for an intensive week at a time.  The choir was launched at the VI International Festival of Renaissance and Baroque music in Bolivia in April 2006. As well as four concerts, they made a documentary for the American CBS '60 Minutes' programme and recorded a CD (Bolivian Baroque volume 2) with Florilegium.  In February 2008 they made their first European tour, including concerts in The Netherlands’ major concert halls; also performing at the Royal College of Music and broadcast live on BBC Radio 3’s ‘In Tune’.  During that tour they recorded Bolivian Baroque volume 3 in collaboration with Ashley and Florilegium.  The choir, with Ashley, regularly give performances in Bolivia.

The Choir will be accompanied on the tour by Dr. Piotr Nawrot, the Polish Jesuit priest who has re-discovered and transcribed this music. He, together with Ashley Solomon, will give a pre-concert talk before most of these performances.

The programme for the performances with Florilegium is:

Brentner - Gloria et honore
Anon - Sonata Chiquitanas No.XVIII
Araujo - 2 Villiancicos:  Si el amor, Al Llanto mas tierno
Zipoli - Toccata in D minor
Bassani - Missa Santa Ana
INTERVAL
Bassani - Missa a la Fuga
Anon - Salve a 8
Anon - Stella Coeli
Anon - Eia Fidelis
Balbi - Sonata Chiquitanas No.IX
Zipoli - Te Deum Laudamus
Anon - Cantemus Domino

The Choir has only given one concert previously in the UK.  In February 2008 the Director of the Royal College of Music invited the group to perform there following a tour of The Netherlands, and they sang to a capacity concert hall.  Richard Morrison, reviewing the concert for The Times, wrote of the choir: “These are gossamer light and radiantly clear voices, singing with delicacy, a wonderfully springy sense of rhythm and true joy.”

Arakaendar Bolivia Choir has recorded three CDs of Baroque music from the Bolivian Missions with Florilegium, both of which were highly acclaimed. Among other awards, Volume 1 was Gramophone Editor’s Choice (March 2007); Volume 2 was BBC Music Magazine’s Disc of the Month (April 2010), with the review “The sound is captivating – fresh-toned and inexhaustibly animated… The music is totally absorbing from beginning to end.”

Arakaendar is a word in one of the indigenous languages of Bolivia, Guarayo – and means ancient or old.

For more details and a full story so far of Florilegium’s Bolivian Baroque, the Bolivian Diary pages of this website.