About

Eboracum Baroque

Eboracum Baroque is an ensemble of professional singers and instrumentalists, described as ‘Spectacular’ by Classic FM. The group was formed in 2012 by Chris Parsons at the University of York and has performed across the UK and Europe in prestigious venues and festivals including Senate House, Cambridge, The Temple Church, London and Christuskirche, Hannover. As well as their concert performances, they have given fully staged performances of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas and Handel’s Acis and Galatea. 

The ensemble performs many famous works from across the Renaissance and Baroque period. They have a particular specialism in English music from the 17th and 18th Century and they endeavour to champion lesser-known English composers from the period. In January 2015 Eboracum Baroque recorded their first CD Music for Wimpole Hall, which was funded by the National Trust and Arts Council England. The CD features music by English Baroque composer Thomas Tudway (1650-1726) and was recorded at Wimpole Hall near Cambridge, where Tudway worked from 1714-1726. It was described by The Guardian as ‘Stylish Choral Singing and playing.’ Their second CD Sounds of Suffolk was released in November 2018 and features forgotten music from 18th century Suffolk including violin sonatas by Joseph Gibbs and music from Ickworth House.

They perform at a number of National Trust estates across the UK, including Wimpole Hall, Oxburgh Hall and Canons Ashby where they present programmes unique to the history of each property. The group have also given performances at the famous Orchard Tea Garden in Grantchester. 

In December 2015 the group went on its first major tour abroad with performances of Handel’s Messiah in Münster and Hannover in Germany, receiving standing ovations by sell-out audiences. In December 2016 they toured Estonia, with concerts of Bach’s Magnificat and Vivaldi’s Magnificat in Tartu and Tallinn, including a live broadcast on Estonian National Radio.

 During the COVID-19 pandemic, the group remained extremely active with themed virtual concerts, ‘spotlight concerts’ focussing on individual instruments and a large scale project, ‘Heroic Handel’ which had over 50,000 views on Facebook alone within a month of its premiere. You can enjoy this project and much more on our YouTube page.

The group run an active education programme which works with schools, festivals and music hubs across the UK. Recent projects have been based around Handel’s Water Music and Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. Eboracum Baroque are delighted to continue to work with the Horrible Histories author, Terry Deary on a number of projects where they hope to introduce the next generation of musicians to Baroque music. Performances with Terry have included a new narration of Purcell’s King Arthur and The Fairy Queen and a show called ‘The Glorious Georgians’ which received 5 star reviews at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.