Performer Biographies
Kiri Tollaksen
enjoys a varied career as a performer and teacher. Equally skilled on cornetto and modern trumpet, Kiri has been praised for her "stunning technique, and extreme musicality," (Journal of the International Trumpet Guild). She has performed extensively throughout North America and Europe with numerous groups such as Apollo's Fire, The Folger Consort, Piffaro, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, New York Collegium, Concerto Palatino, La Fenice, the Huelgas Ensemble, the Catacoustic Consort and Seattle Baroque Orchestra. She has performed both at the Boston Early Music Festival, and at the Bloomington Early Music Festival, and she is a regular member of the quartets La Gente d'Orfeo and Anaphantasia, both based in Ann Arbor, Michigan.
As a professional trumpet player, Kiri performs with the River Raisin Ragtime Revue in Tecumseh, Michigan. From 1996-2005, she played the Eb soprano saxhorn with the Dodworth Saxhorn Band (a re-creation of a 19th century community brass band, based in Ann Arbor). Kiri is featured on the Dodworth’s latest CD, Home Sweet Home. From 1995-2004, Kiri was a member of the Greater Lansing Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Maestro Gustav Meier.
Kiri is currently a visiting artist at the Early Music Institute at Indiana University. She also maintains a teaching studio in Ann Arbor, and has taught cornetto at the Amherst Early Music Festival. Kiri holds performing degrees in trumpet from Eastman, Yale, and a Doctorate in Musical Arts from the University of Michigan. Her discography includes recordings with the Huelgas Ensemble, Apollo's Fire, Piffaro, The New York Collegium, La Gente d'Orfeo, and the Dodworth Saxhorn Band. For upcoming concerts, please visit http://www.KiriTollaksen.com.
Daniel Foster
Daniel Foster has taught violin and viola at Eastern Michigan
University, Ypsilanti, Michigan since 1987. He holds degrees in violin
performance from the University of Illinois and the University of
Michigan. Since 1978, he has appeared frequently throughout the United
States as a solo and chamber artist, with repertoire ranging from the
seventeenth through the twentieth century. As a baroque violinist and
violist, he has performed and recorded with Ars Music Baroque
Orchestra, Smithsonian Chamber Players, Oriana, and Tafelmusik, and is a current
and founding member of Trio Giusto, a trio with baroque flute and cello
specializing in late Baroque and early Classical repertoire. He is a
member of the Alexander Trio, faculty piano trio at Eastern Michigan
University, and a founding member of the Honolulu-based Red Hot Lava
Chamber Ensemble.
Debra Lonergan
was a long standing member of the Michigan Opera Theatre Orchestra and worked extensively with Ars Musica Baroque Orchestra, including its 1989 Michigan MozartFest and a twenty-city national tour celebrating the 1985 Bach anniversary year. Currently a member of Anaphantasia, Mirabel and Milwaukee Baroque, as well as La Gente, she has been invited to play basso continuo in concert for renowned Baroque specialists including violinists Jaap Schroeder and Stanley Ritchie, cellist and gambist Enid Sutherland, soprano Ellen Hargis, and harpsichordist David Schrader. Ms. Lonergan also served as an academic program administrator for the Center for Creative Studies-Institute of Music and Dance in Detroit. She has made an extensive study of string pedagogy, and with nearly 30 years teaching experience, maintains an active Ann Arbor studio today. She plays a Ubel bass viol and an English cello in its original condition from the Walmsley School, ca. 1780.
Martha
Folts'
keyboard repertoire
covers a wide range of styles. Beginning her performing
career as an exponent of avant garde organ music, she
performed recitals at colleges and universities throughout
the U.S. and at conventions for the American Guild of
Organists including the National Convention in Boston, 1976.
In addition she performed at 20th century music festivals in
Sinzig, Germany, Toulouse, France, and Aarhus, Denmark.
Returning in recent years to keyboard
repertoire of the 16th - 18th centuries, Martha Folts has
presented recitals and workshops throughout the midwest
including Susquehana University, Selinsgrove, PA, John
Carroll University, Cleveland, OH, Kenyon College, Gambier,
OH, Ripon College, Ripon, WI, Augustana College, Rock
Island, IL. An Iowa tour included concerts at Iowa State
University, Ames, Central College, Pella, IA, Drake
University, Des Moines, IA, and the University of Iowa, Iowa
City. Additional recitals include the Lincoln Organ Showcase
Series, Nebraska, and the Region VI convention of the
American Guild of Organists where she gave harpsichord
recitals on historic instruments at the Shrine to Music
Museum in Vermillion, SD. Ms. Folts joined two colleagues in
performances of J.S. Bach’s concertos for multiple
harpsichords (BWV 1061,1063 and 1064) in a concert at
Eastern Michigan University for the Region V Convention of
the American Guild of Organists in June, 1999. As a member
of the Midwest Historical Keyboard Society she has given
lecture-recitals on Italian keyboard music and participated
in performances of Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier.
Martha Folts has taught on the faculties
of Iowa state University in Ames and Miami University in
Oxford, Ohio. Moving to Michigan she completed the Doctor of
Musical Arts Degree in harpsichord performance at the
University of Michigan in April, 2000, studying with Edward
Parmentier.
Martha Folts has recorded for the Delos
and Musical Heritage Society labels, and her recorded
performances on both organ and harpsichord have been
broadcast on WGUC-FM in Cincinnati and over Minnesota Public
Radio. She also serves as vice president of the Midwest
Historical Keyboard Society.
Dr. Folts presently teaches at Adrian
College, Adrian, Michigan, is a member of the ensemble “La
Gente d’Orfeo”, specializing in the performance of
17th-century Italian repertoire. She serves as Minister of
Music at St. Paul United Church of Christ in Chelsea, MI
where she resides with her husband, Stephen.
Past Events
February 6, 2005 4 pm
Music at Memorial
Singet Dem Herrn (Sing To The Lord)!
17th c. Sacred And Secular Music
of Northern Germany
with guest artist, Brian White, tenor
Grosse Pointe Memorial Church
Grosse Pointe Farms, MI
May 22, 2004
Midwest Historical Keyboard Society
Grand Valley State University
August 2004
Recording project of Passion and Repose:
an Early Italian Musical Extravaganza
Grosse Pointe, MI
January 11, 2004
Grosse Pointe Memorial Church
Grosse Pointe, MI
October 19, 2003
Marshall’s Day of Music at the Max
Detroit Symphony Orchestra two-day music event
September 14, 2003
St. Lorenz Lutheran Church
Frankenmuth, MI
September 13, 2003
Academy of Early Music’s 2003-2004 Concert Series
Ann Arbor, MI
September 12, 2003
St. Peter’s Catholic Church
Brighton, MI
March 16, 2003
“Harmony of the Spheres”
Academy of Early Music 2002-2003 Concert Series
Ann Arbor, MI
March 15, 2003
House Concert for Phillip Powers
(benefactors of the University of Michigan and the Power Center)
Ann Arbor, MI
March 14, 2003
“Harmony of the Spheres” with Ensemble Vox
Concert in conjunction with the opening of the exhibit “Magnificenza! The Medici, Michelangelo, and the Art of Late Renaissance Florence”
Institute of Arts
Detroit, MI
March 8, 2002
Fine Arts Friday
Institute of Arts
Detroit, MI
February 17, 2002
Concert in connection with exhibit "Women Who Ruled: Queens, Goddesses, Amazons 1500-1650
University of Michigan's Museum of Art
Ann Arbor, MI
September 25, 2001
Candlelight Concert
St. Paul’s Church
Chelsea, MI
(Proceeds to the Firefighters of 9/11 fund, and to the music ministry at St. Paul’s)
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