Album Notes

Rosamund Morley, treble viol
Lawrence Lipnik, tenor viol
Bevelry Au, bass viol and treble viol
Lisa Terry, bass viol

Parthenia, A Consort of Viols

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Parthenia is a dynamic string ensemble that explores the extraordinary
repertoire for viols of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries - from Elizabethan England to the Court of Versailles -- along with brilliant works of today's composers. Since 1989 this critically-acclaimed, New York-based viol consort has been performing to the delight of audiences across the United States and Europe. The consort of viols, much loved by musicians in Renaissance Europe, is the precursor of today's string quartet. Parthenia is devoted to bringing passionate viol consort performances to the contemporary listener.

The members of Parthenia, Beverly Au, Lawrence Lipnik, Rosamund Morley, and Lisa Terry, are well-known individually for their engaging and virtuosic performances with the best early-music ensembles in America, among them Les Arts Florissants, Anonymous 4,Ensemble for Early Music, The Waverly Consort, The Four Nations Ensemble, Piffaro, Pomerium, Concert Royal, Lionheart, and ARTEK. Parthenia has been featured at many prestigious festivals and concert series such as Music Before 1800, Metropolitan Museum of Art's Grace Rainey Auditorium, and Medieval Sculpture Hall,the Regensberg Tage Alter Musik (Germany), Maverick Concerts, the Arizona Early Music Society, and the Amherst Early Music Festival.

Parthenia is an Associate Ensemble of the Early Music Foundation, Frederick Renz, Director.

"...[PARTHENIA'S] SOUND, A BEAUTIFUL SOUND, FILLED THE ROOM LIKE INCENSE. "
The New Yorker

". . . A FIRST-RATE PERIOD INSTRUMENT BAND." The New York Times

"THE ENSEMBLE SENSE BETWEEN THESE PLAYERS MADE FOR FLAWLESS MUSICAL THOUGHT."
The Woodstock [NY] Times

"PARTHENIA'S EXQUISITE RENDERINGS . . . WERE NOBLE AND MOURNFUL. THE EFFECT WAS ETHEREAL." The Arizona Daily Star

". . .ONE OF THE FINEST CONCERTS OF THE 1994 [REGENSBERG] ALTER MUSIK
FESTIVAL." The Mittelbayerische Zeitung.