Armonia Celeste Ensemble
“Udite Amanti-Beware Lovers”
Music from the 17th Century Barberini Courts

The ensemble Armonia Celeste (Italian for “heavenly harmony”) brings the music of the Italian Renaissance and Baroque eras vividly to life for audiences across America.

With three distinct and beautiful female voices singing in close harmony accompanied by plucked-string period instruments, the musicians of Armonia Celeste infuse their historically informed performances with unforgettable passion and joy.

Tickets: $15/$10 students

Delighting audiences around the country with their spirited performances, Armonia Celeste (ar-mo-NEE-a che-LES-tay) is an emerging ensemble specializing in rarely heard repertoire from the Italian Renaissance and early Baroque. The group is comprised of three distinct female voices accompanied by period instruments: lute, theorbo, guitar, and the rare arpa doppia (Baroque triple harp). Each of the five members of the ensemble is a highly experienced solo performer in their own right; together, the musicians create an unforgettable combination of varied vocal and instrumental colors, florid ornamentation, expressiveness, and a noticeable passion for this repertoire.

The idea for Armonia Celeste came about in 2008 when the musicians performed together at the Misiones de Chiquitos International American Renaissance and Baroque Music Festival in Santa Cruz, Bolivia. Since then, the ensemble has been featured in a concert of Monteverdi’s Il settimo Libro di Madrigali with the Dallas Bach Society, performed at the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth in conjunction with the museum’s exhibit, “Art and Love in Renaissance Italy,” and has offered many concerts throughout Texas and Oklahoma. At the 2009 Boston Early Music Festival, Armonia Celeste presented an extremely well-received fringe concert entitled “Love and Longing.” Early in 2010, the group appeared in, and provided music for, an educational PBS documentary presented by Early Music Television entitled “Culture Wars of Venice and the Birth of Public Opera.” Eugene Enrico, Early Music Television organizer and professor of Musicology at the University of Oklahoma School of Music, commented, "[The] new professional ensemble Armonia Celeste is the finest group I’ve heard performing early baroque Italian music.”