Music of Medieval Spain

Karen Burciaga is an early strings specialist who bridges the worlds of classical and folk music. She is a founding member of Boston’s folk/early music ensemble Seven Times Salt and the viol consort Long & Away. Karen has performed on violin and viola da gamba across New England and Texas with groups including The King’s Noyse, Arcadia Players, Zenith Ensemble, Austin Baroque Orchestra, and others. She recently appeared in Boston’s Midwinter Revels playing vielle and rebec. A lifelong love of Celtic music led her into the world of folk traditions, and she enjoys fiddling (and dancing!) Scottish, Irish, English, and contra styles, with occasional forays into Cornish and Breton territory.

Robert Eisenstein (Artistic Director, viol, violin,recorder) has led over 200 productions and performances with Folger Consort over the past 40 years include Measure + Dido at the Kennedy Center and Napa Valley Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice at Strathmore, The Fairy Queen, and Hildegard Von Bingen’s Ordo Virtutum at the Washington National Cathedral.  Director of the Five College Early Music Program; Music Director for the Five College Opera Project production of Francesca Caccini’s La Liberazione di Ruggiero. Faculty member of Mount Holyoke College, where he teaches music history and performs the viola de gamba, violin, and medieval fiddle.  He is an active participant in the Five College Medieval Studies. Recipient of Early Music America’s Thomas Binkley Award for outstanding achievement in performance and scholarship by the director of a college early music ensemble. 

Ronnie Malley is a multi-instrumentalist musician (oud, guitar, keyboards, and percussion), composer, theatrical performer, producer, playwright, educator, and executive director of Intercultural Music Production. He specializes in various musical styles from the Middle East, North Africa, South Asia, and medieval Spain and has performed with several global artists and ensembles including Allos Musica, Apollo’s Fire, Diwan al-Han, EMME, Huzam, Lamajamal, Las Guitarras de España, Lute Legends Collective, Mucca Pazza, Newberry Consort, Picosa, Omar Offendum, Surabhi Ensemble, University of Chicago Middle East Music Ensemble, and Yves Francois & Rocambu Jazz. Ronnie has worked on award-winning theatrical plays, films, and TV series including The Band’s Visit (Broadway, Tony Awards, Grammy Awards), Mo (Netflix), The Jungle Book (Disney, Goodman Theatre), American Griot (Kennedy Center Citizen Artist Award), and The New Mother (Eleva Singleton).

A versatile multi-instrumentalist, Dan Meyers is a flexible and engaging performer of both classical and folk music; his credits range from premieres of contemporary chamber music, to headlining a concert series in honor of Pete Seeger at the Newport Folk Festival, to playing Renaissance instruments on Broadway for Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre Company. He is a founding member of the early music/folk crossover group Seven Times Salt, and in recent seasons he has performed with the The Newberry Consort, Hesperus, The Henry Purcell Society of Boston, Early Music New York, Amherst Early Music, The 21st Century Consort, In Stile Moderno, and the Cambridge Revels, making concert and theatrical appearances in NYC, Washington DC, Chicago, Minneapolis, Memphis, Santa Fe, at the Yellow Barn Festival in Vermont, and at at the “La Luna e i Calanchi” festival in Basilicata (Italy).

Regarded for over four decades as one of the world’s finest countertenors, Drew Minter grew up as a boy treble in the Washington Cathedral Choir of Men and Boys.  He continued his education at Indiana University and the Musik Hochschule of Vienna.  Drew appeared in leading roles with the opera companies of Brussels, Toulouse, Boston, Washington, Santa Fe, Wolf Trap, Glimmerglass, and Nice, among others.  A recognized specialist in the works of Handel, he performed frequently at the Handel festivals of Göttingen, Halle, Karlsruhe, Maryland.  As a countertenor he sang with many of the world’s leading baroque orchestras, including Les Arts Florissants, the Handel and Haydn Society, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, Freiburger Barockorchester, and as a guest at festivals such as Tanglewood, Ravinia, Regensburg, BAM’s Next Wave, Edinburgh, Spoleto, and Boston Early Music; other orchestra credits include the Philadelphia Orchestra, the San Francisco Orchestra and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

Emily Noël performs a wide variety of repertory expanding from the Medieval to the contemporary. Favorite Folger performances include: Gloria!, Davenant’s Macbeth, Second Shepherds’ Play, An English Garden, Play of Love, Measure + Dido, The Merchant of Venice, Christmas in New Spain, and Map of the World. She has also appeared as a soloist with the Washington Bach Consort, Washington National Cathedral, LyricFest, Ente Concerti Città di Iglesias, Amsterdam Grachtenfestival, American Opera Theater, Mountainside Baroque, Seven Times Salt, Early Interval, and Santa Fe Desert Chorale. A passionate educator, Emily has served on the faculties of Franklin & Marshall College, Notre Dame of Maryland University, and The Community College of Rhode Island. She currently teaches voice at Denison University and directs the Cardinal Singers at Otterbein University.

Naeif Rafeh is a former member of the Syrian National Symphony, now living in Chicago, IL for over twenty years. Naeif was born in Jaramana, Syria – a village about ten minutes south of Damascus in 1971. He attended the High Institute for Music and Ballet in Damascus, where he received a Bachelor’s degree in Music – studying both Western and Arabic music – in 1996. He plays the Nay (Arabic flute), and is considered a virtuoso by his peers and audiences. While attending the institute, he was a member of the Syrian National Symphony – as well as other Middle Eastern orchestras. He played in festivals around the Middle East and Europe, and taught at several academic locations throughout Syria. Naeif is an active performer here in Chicago and is considered one of the most promising Nay players in the Middle East. He plays with other Arab musicians as a member of Chicago Maqam. He is also a successful promotor of Arab music, bringing some of the biggest names in the Middle East to Chicago.

Firas Zreik (Kanun) Artist-composer, lyricist and educator Firas Zreik has performed and recorded across the world as a leader and highly sought collaborator. The Palestine-born New Yorker has transformed global perception of the Kanun. His treatment of the instrument preserves its identity as a vital part of the Maqam tradition and stretches its potential as a cultural chameleon enhancing a range of fresh, evolving sounds. He has collaborated with a cross section of leaders, including Roger Waters, Simon Shaheen, Shankar Mahadevan, Aynur Dogan, G.E. Smith, David Broza and Amal Murkus, for whom he serves as musical director. He has appeared at WOMEX international music expo, Smithsonian Museum, Savannah Music Festival, The Jazz Gallery, Lincoln Center and Historic Greenwood; Boston Symphony Hall and Berklee Performance Center; and Teatro Mediterraneo in Italy. Zreik received his BA in Music from Berklee College of Music — where he received a full presidential scholarship — completing a double major in Performance and Jazz Composition. Recently, Zreik was chosen as the sole musician for inclusion on the Arab America Foundation’s 30 Under 30 list.