THE NEW CONSORT
About
Winners of the American Prize in Chamber Music, THE NEW CONSORT, a project-based, solo-voice ensemble directed by baritone Brian Mummert, was founded in 2015 and has quickly made embracing stylistic contrasts one of its hallmarks. Musical variety is an integral part of the ensemble's identity: from Renaissance polyphony to contemporary & non-classical works, nothing is off-limits. By embracing contrasts and drawing diverse works into conversation, The New Consort attracts new audiences to classical music and encourages them to forge connections with unfamiliar genres of musical expression. The ensemble has appeared in venues including Trinity College, Cambridge; The Walters Art Museum's First Fridays series; The Bach Store, an NYC pop-up concert hall; High Hopes' Music Under the Stars (CT); Spectrum NYC; and at churches and schools throughout the Northeast. Members of The New Consort have appeared as soloists and conductors with some of the world’s best-respected ensembles from Carnegie Hall to Kuala Lumpur, but relish the opportunity that the ensemble presents to collaborate as chamber musicians.
Upcoming: A Close Harmony Christmas
Join us to ring in the season with A Close Harmony Christmas! This enchanting evening of holiday classics, both familiar and new, that is sure to delight music lovers of all ages. Reception with the artists to follow. Purchase tickets through Eventbrite to our December 10 show in Old Lyme by clicking the Buy Tickets button below; for information about our invitation-only performance in New York City, please reach out to Brian Mummert through this website’s Contact page.
MORE INFORMATION
Please contact Brian Mummert through the Contact page on this site if you are interested in hiring The New Consort for an event. To stay up-to-date on the ensemble's activities, sign up for our mailing list below!
PAST PROJECTS
DECEMBER 2020
We're delighted to present the first installment of The Arch Sessions: That Fair Flower, featuring some of our favorite music for Christmas! Please enjoy these videos, filmed under Glade & Greywacke Arches in New York City's Central Park. In this abnormally-quiet December for performers and music lovers alike, we hope that The Arch Sessions can help get you in the holiday spirit. For more information about The New Consort, please sign up for our mailing list - thanks so much for watching, and we look forward to singing for you in person!
APRIL 2019
The New Consort is going on its first tour! Come and hear this gorgeous music at any of our three stops next month, and make sure to stay and say hello afterward. There will be wine.
Subtler Than Light: Music of the Dow Partbooks is a concert about seeking equilibrium: warding off despair for our imperfect world with hope, and striving for balance between sombre contemplation and joy. Preserved within calligrapher Robert Dow’s 1588 partbooks, one finds a snapshot of exemplary Tudor-era composers struggling to make sense of the world through the lens of their Christian faith; from Robert White’s Lamentations to William Byrd’s Laetentur coeli, these Elizabethan masters endeavor to capture the scope of human emotion. Two world premieres by Rosśa Crean and Ethan McGrath reinforce the idea that we turn to forces greater than ourselves in this search for equilibrium… though not always the ones we might expect.
Friday, April 5, 7 PM: First Congregational Church, Nantucket, MA - buy tickets at bit.ly/partbooks-ack or by calling (917) 740-9694
Saturday, April 6, 4 PM: Saint Ann’s Parish, Old Lyme, CT - buy tickets at bit.ly/partbooks or by calling (917) 740-9694
Sunday, April 7, 3 PM: St. Paul’s Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn, NY - buy tickets at bit.ly/partbooks-bk or by calling (917) 740-9694
JANUARY 2019
Join us for O Stars, Conspiring Against Me, an examination of the evolving depiction of women in music. The program is built around the American premiere of The Turn, a piece by UK-based composer Ben Rowarth designed to be interspersed with, and thus recontextualize, Claudio Monteverdi’s Lamento d’Arianna. Stories of other legendary female figures comprise the remainder of the program, primarily set by women composers from the past six centuries. Discounted advance tickets available here: bit.ly/o-stars
Wednesday, January 16, 8 PM
$20 Advance | $25 Door ($10 discount for students)
Spectrum, 70 Flushing Ave, Brooklyn NY 11205
DECEMBER 2018
Surprise! We have a concert - and it’s coming up this weekend!
Join The New Consort in celebrating the music of Johann Sebastian Bach at The Bach Store, an all-Bach pop-up, this Sunday, Dec 2, at 6:15 PM. We’re thrilled to be one of the featured guest artists on this installation and concert series exploring the work of this master composer. For more details about The Bach Store, check out this recent NYTimes profile: https://www.nytimes.com/…/23/a…/music/pop-up-bach-store.ht
The program consists of three of his best-loved motets: Komm, Jesu, komm; Jesu, meine Freude; and Singet dem Herrn, all performed by an octet of young professional singers from around NYC. $10 suggested donation at the door, located on the southeast corner of W 56th and Broadway. Hope to see you there!
SEPTEMBER 2018
Thank you all for joining us at High Hopes’ Music Under the Stars last month! We’re in the midst of planning several exciting projects, including the American premiere of emerging UK composer Ben Rowarth’s The Turn paired with the music of Monteverdi later this fall in NYC, and a New England tour of the music of the Dow Partbooks in April. To stay abreast of our activities, please subscribe to our email list. Thanks, looking forward to seeing you at our next concert!
MARCH 2017
the little match girl passion
Come experience David Lang's Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece, the little match girl passion, performed by The New Consort. Lang's work powerfully confronts secular issues of homelessness and disenfranchisement within a sacred framework drawn from the Passions of Bach. These are issues that persist within the Cambridge community; in an attempt to effect change, we are donating all proceeds from this concert to Jimmy's, Cambridge's only emergency homeless shelter.
Tickets are free, with a requested retiring donation; email barry@jimmyscambridge.org.uk for reservations.
Sunday 12 March 2017, 8:30 PM: The Round Church, Cambridge, UK
APRIL 2016
MUCH ADO ABOUT MUSIC: 400 Years of Shakespeare in Song
In commemoration of the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, The New Consort presents this musical celebration of the Bard’s enduring legacy. The hour-long program will include music written by English composers of Shakespeare’s time, settings of Shakespeare’s texts by a variety of more recent composers, and readings from some of his greatest plays and sonnets. We are particularly excited to present the world premiere of “When He Shall Die,” composed specifically for The New Consort on this occasion by Lyme resident and Wesleyan emeritus faculty member Sarah Meneely-Kyder. The concert aims to celebrate the life and work of this great artist, whose characters and stories continue to wield influence across our culture to this day.
Thursday, April 21, 7 PM: The Country School, 341 Opening Hill Road, Madison, CT
Saturday, April 23, 5 PM: St. Ann's Episcopal Church, 82 Shore Road, Old Lyme, CT
OCTOBER 2015
The New Consort WINS the 2015 American Prize in Chamber Music!
For more information about The American Prize, please visit their website.
To book The New Consort or for more information about us, please reach out via the Contact page.
LISTEN
A Boy and a Girl by Eric Whitacre
WATCH
Eyesight by Steven Stucky
In pace by Christopher Tye
To Mock Your Reign by Andrew Smith
There is an old belief by Charles Hubert Hastings Parry
