-Upper Valley Baroque (UVB), a 6-year-old ensemble dedicated to professional performance of Baroque music on original instruments, is branching out from the Upper Valley to the Brattleboro area, where it will present three of its five 2026–2027 season concerts.
Up first Friday, Oct. 16, at Persons Auditorium in Marlboro, on the Campus at Marlboro Music, is Giovanni Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater.
Described in a press release as “one of the most popular works of the 18th century,” the piece “offers a profound meditation on grief, empathy, and love. Its gorgeous vocal lines are, by turns, soaring and intricate, supported by dramatic yet transparent writing for strings.”
Also on that program will be UVB soloists in a ”selection of virtuosic arias from George Frideric Handel’s Giulio Cesare, interspersed with narration to set the dramatic tone.”
Founding Artistic Director Filippo Ciabatti has guest conducted orchestras across Europe and the Americas, and he directs the Opera Company of Middlebury, as well as both the orchestral and choral programs at the Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth College.
Ciabatti, praised by the UVB in its promotions for having “spearheaded innovative projects that provide exceptional opportunities for both students and audiences,” lives in the Upper Valley.
He spoke with The Commons recently via Zoom from his native Florence, Italy.
Ciabatti explains that UVB formed on the heels of the pandemic. Cofounded with Upper Valley’s Jo Shute and Allan Weiman, the intention from the start has been “to create something at the highest possible professional level,” he explains.
To bring Baroque music to the Upper Valley, the team started by holding general auditions in the area and then in Boston, “one of the best places in the country for early music,” i.e., music from the Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque periods, he says.
“We heard some singers, instrumentalists; we met some people,” all in an effort to form a top-notch choir and orchestra “that would present these great masterpieces with period instruments — instruments as close as possible to what we think [would have been played] at the times when these great masterpieces were performed.”
Aiming to offer something new to the area, Ciabatti explains, “we tried to create a repertoire of the great heavy hitters of the Baroque period” while also performing works “a little bit more off the beaten path.”
And so, in 2021, UVB launched “with a lot of enthusiasm and love for the music with no knowledge whatsoever of how this whole thing was going to go, and it’s gone very well,” Ciabatti recalls. “People immediately have shown an interest and affection. And the group from there has grown tremendously.”
UVB, he says, is “getting the best musicians in the country.”
That roster of talent includes Concertmaster Susanna Ogata, who’s also assistant concertmaster of Boston’s highly regarded Handel and Haydn Society.
“Our principals play in Boston Baroque, in Handel and Haydn, in the Philharmonia Baroque; they play internationally, they play nationally as soloists, so we really have the best of the best,” Ciabatti says. The same applies to the UVB’s choirs and the solo vocalists.
Of the venues added this season, Ciabatti says, “my interest has always been to bring this music and this wonderful group as far as possible into the region — to get this wonderful music to other communities.”
Thus, Brattleboro and Marlboro “were a very obvious choice as we started to talk to people, to colleagues,” he says.
When he visited the Latchis, Ciabatti recalls, “everyone was encouraging. There is a great community of music lovers there.”
He says that audiences “love to attend” the concerts in the Upper Valley “because of the great colleagues and the great music, and because there’s an atmosphere of real community.”
“We hope that, in coming into Brattleboro and Marlboro, we can bring this same sense, because I know from many colleagues there that it’s the same thing where you are. There’s a very strong sense of community, and that’s an important part, an integral part of the mission of music making,” Ciabatti says.
Great masterpieces on period instruments
Ogata, who has performed at the Brattleboro Music Center (BMC), joined the conversation to reflect on audiences for Baroque music.
“I find that there is definitely an audience, young to old, and a market for this,” she says. “I think it’s really thriving. If you look in America, you know, Baroque groups are forming all over the country.”
The UVB, Ogata notes, sees “audiences of all ages at our programs, which is wonderful.”
She also leads a UVB effort, Music Inside Out, in which samples from the Baroque period are used in an outreach program for young ages that explores music and emotions.
In both Baroque- and Classical-period music, she notes, there’s “a real emphasis on how the music could inform or inflame various emotions that we have.”
She holds that “kids can relate to that,” referencing a popular animated movie, Inside Out, which explores different emotions with which a middle school teen might wrestle.
This year UVB is stretching, Ciabatti explains, and “venturing to Mozart,” traditionally considered Classical repertoire, “because I think a lot of people have interest in hearing these great masterpieces on period instruments. People realize that period instruments give a sense of liveliness and a certain particular sound that is actually very edgy.”
Thus, the second appearance of UVB here will be “Multi-Faceted Mozart,” with the UVB Orchestra and Horn Soloist Todd Williams, at the Latchis Theatre on Friday, Jan. 22, 2027.
“We’ll open with his beloved and elegant Eine kleine Nachtmusik, then feature a renowned horn soloist in the Horn Concerto in D major; then, finally, his Symphony No. 40 in G minor, which reveals an emotional depth and passion that redefined symphonic music,” Ciabatti says.
Finally, Saturday, May 15, 2027, also at the Latchis, UVB will present J.S. Bach’s 300-year-old St. Matthew Passion, a massive and challenging work with double chorus and orchestra — on period instruments. This, says Ciabatti, will be “the biggest, most ambitious project that we’ve done so far.”
Acknowledging the Marlboro Music Festival and the Brattleboro Music Center, he says “we’re hoping that people will come and check us out.”
The UVB hopes this is the start of a long relationship with Brattleboro and its musical community, says Ciabatti, who hopes for more engagements in the future — and even collaboration, perhaps.
Tickets are available at uppervalleybaroque.org/concerts, by calling 203-240-1164, or at the door. Student tickets are always free.
This Arts item by Annie Landenberger was written for The Commons.