A noontime concert will feature renowned flutist and keyboard player

“Concerti from the Court of Frederick the Great,” will be presented by the Salish Sea Early Music Festival.

By Elizabeth Shepherd • April 13, 2022 1:30 am
(Wikimedia Commons Artwork) In Adolph von Menzel’s “Flute Concert of Frederick the Great in Sanssouci” (1752) the king is playing the flute, his flute teacher Quantz leans against the wall on the far right, and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach plays the harpsichord. At a concert on 12 p.m. Monday, April 25, at the Church of the Holy Spirit, Jeffrey Cohan will play an exact replica of the king’s flute.
(Wikimedia Commons Artwork) In Adolph von Menzel’s “Flute Concert of Frederick the Great in Sanssouci” (1752) the king is playing the flute, his flute teacher Quantz leans against the wall on the far right, and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach plays the harpsichord. At a concert on 12 p.m. Monday, April 25, at the Church of the Holy Spirit, Jeffrey Cohan will play an exact replica of the king’s flute.

A “Concerti from the Court of Frederick the Great,” will be presented by the Salish Sea Early Music Festival at 12 p.m. Monday, April 25, at the Church of the Holy Spirit, on Vashon.

The concert will feature keyboard artist David Schrader and flutist Jeffrey Cohan, along with a baroque chamber orchestra, performing a program of concerti originally composed by Frederick the Great and performed with his flute teacher Quantz, and his court keyboardist, Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach, in the mid-1700s.

The concert was captured in a painting by Adolph von Menzel in 1747; Cohan’s flute is an exact replica of the flute being played by the king in the painting. The flute’s pitch is extremely low, creating a particularly sonorous sound.

Keyboard artist David Schrader, a resident of Chicago, is featured in the concert. Schrader is equally accomplished in front of a harpsichord, organ, piano, or fortepiano, and has performed as a featured soloist with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra under Neeme Järvi, and with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Sir Georg Solti and other acclaimed conductors.

He has appeared with the Grant Park Symphony, the Colorado Symphony Orchestra, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, El Paso Symphony Orchestra, and many other orchestras throughout the USA and Canada.

His numerous recordings include concerti of J.S. Bach with the Stuttgarter Kammerorchester, and with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for both recordings of Sir Georg Solti’s Creation, the St. Matthew Passion (BWV 244) and Messiah. He is currently on the faculty of Roosevelt University, Chicago College of Performing Arts – Music Conservatory.

In addition to flutist Cohan, the orchestra at the April 25 concert will also include Elizabeth Phelps and Courtney Kuroda on baroque violin, Lindsey Strand-Polyak on baroque viola and Annabeth Shirley on baroque cello.

A donation of $15, $20 or $25 is suggested for the concert, with youth 18 and younger admitted free. Masks and vaccination are required to attend.

Next up in the noontime concert series at the Church of the Holy Spirit, Salish Sea Early Music Festival will present “The Baroque Quartet” on May 9, featuring internationally known soloists and period-instrument specialists.

For more information, visit salishseamusicfestival.org.