Now in its third season, Natur is a professional historical music ensemble specializing in
music written prior to the 1800s. This diverse group of singers and
instrumentalists, which the OC Register
called “confident, proficient, and enjoyable,” performs on a variety of
instruments characteristic to the Renaissance and Baroque periods.
This Southern California-based ensemble has been featured in
the semi-annual Berkeley Early Music Festival, and their performances have
included works by J.S. Bach, Claudio Monteverdi, Henry Purcell, Giulio Caccini,
Luzzasco Luzzaschi, Thomas Morley, Jean-Baptiste Lully, and many others. Natur
recently commissioned composer Paul Gibson to write a signature piece as part
of its 2012-13 concert season. In addition to having a busy schedule performing
throughout the southland, Natur was recently invited to join the professional
artists roster of Roland, the international manufacturer of electronic
instruments and musical equipment.
Tara Bailey (soprano, recorder, co-director)
Bianca Hall (soprano, recorder, harpsichord, co-director)
Claire Fedoruk (soprano, viola da gamba)
Stacey Helley (mezzo-soprano, language specialist)
Stephan Haas (harpsichord, organ, recorder, gemshorn)
The Performers
Tara Bailey
(soprano, recorder) has sung professionally
as a soloist and choral singer in the Los Angeles and Orange County area since
2000. She has been a member of the Los Angeles Classic Ensemble and a featured
soloist at the Crystal Cathedral in Garden Grove. Ms. Bailey has sung under the
direction of conductors such as Helmut Rilling, Christopher Pardini, Martin
Neary, and David Tinoco. Ms. Bailey completed her B.M in Vocal Performance at
University of Southern California and is currently working on the D.M.A. in
Early Music Vocal Performance at USC, under the direction of Adam and Rotem
Gilbert. She has performed the roles of Amor in both Prologues of
Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea and The Return
of Ulysses. She also was a performer in the Los Angeles Microfest
Festival production of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas. She is also
a founding member of the professional group, Natur Early Music Ensemble. Most
recently, she has been given a position at Azusa Pacific University as Adjunct
Professor of Musicology. Ms. Bailey has had the privilege to study with
wonderful instructors and colleagues: Rachelle Fox, Janice McVeigh, Mary
Rawcliffe, Susan Judy, and Karen Clark.www.instantencore.com/tarabailey
Grammy award-winning soprano
Claire Fedoruk
(soprano, viola da gamba)
holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts in Early
Music Performance from the University of Southern California, having earned her
M.M. from the Eastman School of Music and her B.M. from Pacific Lutheran
University. Praised by the Los Angeles Times for her "unfettered
tone and easy clarity" she is a frequent soloist with Los Angeles
Philharmonic, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, Los Angeles Chamber Singers, and
Musica Angelica as well as The Concord Ensemble, and The Natur Early Music
Ensemble, of which she is a member. Dr. Fedoruk’s recording credits are
numerous, including the recent release of Gorecki: Miserere as well as
the 2007 Grammy Award winning Padilla: Son of Justice on the
RCM label. She is also an active studio artist in the film industry, and can be
heard on numerous soundtracks, the most recent being Cowboys and Aliens
(2011), Dorothy of Oz (2012) and Wreck-It Ralph
(2013). Dr. Fedoruk has appeared as a soprano soloist with the early music
ensemble Gravitacíon in Chicago, and with the Los Angeles Master Chorale in New
York City for Steve Reich’s 70th birthday concert series, where
she sang the notoriously challenging top soprano voice of Reich’s
brilliant Tehillim. In Los Angeles, Dr. Fedoruk combines her
performing and teaching careers; she is Associate Professor of Musicology at
Azusa Pacific University. Current and future projects include appearances
as soprano soloist at Disney Hall in Monteverdi's Vespers of 1610,
several appearances with Natur as soprano soloist and viola da gambist, and a
sabbatical leave to write about and premiere the first staged performance of
John Adam's new work The Gospel According to the Other Mary with
the Los Angeles Philharmonic. clairefedoruk.instantencore.com
Bianca Hall (soprano, recorder, harpsichord)
began playing piano at the age of four, but only began
studying voice after completing a Bachelor of Science degree at UCLA. She has
since received the Doctor of Musical Arts degree
Early Music Vocal Performance from USC and
the Master of Music and Bachelor of Music degrees in vocal
performance
both
from CSU Fullerton. She has performed the roles of Drusilla
(Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea), Cherubino (Mozart’s The
Marriage of Figaro) and Dido and the Sorceress (Purcell’s Dido and
Aeneas). Dr. Hall's recordings include “Ancient Christmas Melodies”
(Virlouise Records, 2006), “J.S. Bach: The Six Motets BWV 225-230” (Bach
Collegium San Diego, 2010), and “D’ye Hear the News,” music to accompany 1688:
The First Modern Revolution (Yale University Press, 2011). Dr
. Hall has performed with various ensembles, including Tesserae, Ciaramella, Pacific Bach Project, De Angelis Vocal
Ensemble, and Bach Collegium San Diego, and is a soloist at St. Matthew’s Anglican Church in Newport
Beach.
In addition to being an active performer, Dr.
Hall is also an educator, currently
maintaining a private voice, recorder, and piano studio, giving workshops for voice and recorder, and having previously served as Adjunct Faculty at CSU
Fullerton, where she directed the Collegium Musicum ensemble. www.biancahall.com
Stephan Haas (harpsichord,recorder, organ)
– a USC professor in
physics and a long-time member of the USC Thornton Early
MusicEnsemble, Dr. Haas plays recorder
and harpsichord and specializes in early baroque Italian masters, as well as
modern composers. He has performed with several early
music groups in Europe, Japan and the US
and received first prize in the All Japan Recorder Competition.
Dr. Haas has studied recorder with Brunhilde
Holderbach in Germany, Minoru Yoshizawa in Japan, and Aldo Abreu in the United
States.
Locally, he is a regular guest conductor for
the Los Angeles Recorder Society and the Orange County Recorder
Society. Dr. Haas holds a Ph.D. and M.S. in Physics from Florida State
University, Tallahassee, and a Vordiplom in Physics from Technische Universität
in Berlin Germany.
Stacey Helley (mezzo-soprano)
is originally from the San Francisco Bay Area where she has sung
many rewarding roles with Lamplighter’s Music Theatre since 1991. She got her first BA in French, ran off to
New York City to study opera for six years and then returned to California, and
more roles with Lamplighter’s like Phoebe, Duchesse of Plaza Toro and the Old
Lady in Candide. She returned to Cal
State East Bay for a second BA in music. She completed her MA (with honors) at
USC in Early Music Vocal performance and is continuing in the DMA program. She
recently won the Presser Graduate Award for a project in early Baroque monody. She
can be heard on iTunes with the USC
Thornton Baroque Sinfonia singing
political broadside ballads on D’ye Hear
the News? Selections from the 1689 London Popery Collections. She currently
sings with the Natur Early Music Ensemble in Los Angeles.
www.staceyhelley.com