About Our Orchestra
Opera Lafayette was founded in 1995 as the Violins of Lafayette. From those first chamber performances at The Corcoran Gallery of Art’s Salon Doré, the ensemble grew and developed into an orchestra which has remained at the heart of the organization, receiving international praise for both its recordings and for its performances in Washington, New York, and at the Opéra Royal in Versailles, France. Many of the musicians have played with Opera Lafayette and in chamber ensembles together for over twenty years, fostering a shared musical community focused on artistic excellence.
The orchestra plays on period instruments - old instruments or modern replicas which would have been familiar to the composers whose music Opera Lafayette performs. String instruments are strung with uncovered gut and under less tension than their modern counterparts. Wind and brass instruments have fewer keys or are valveless, which colors their sound differently from their modern counterparts. The instruments played may be different for 17th, 18th, or 19th century repertoire, and singly and together are used as tools to explore the composers' characteristic sound worlds or expressive purposes. Pitch varies for different repertoire, and both the colors of the instruments and and the pitch provide an experience for singers which offers them an opportunity to explore different vocal approaches than they might have with a modern instrument orchestra.
Opera Lafayette's orchestral musicians come from various cities on the Eastern seaboard, university towns in the South and Midwest, and occasionally from the west, Canada, and Europe. They are generally 'free-lancers' who perform with many distinguished groups around the country, teach, and have made a specialty of performing on early instruments. Selected members of the ensemble will often meet in New York or Washington to rehearse repertoire with the conductor, each other, or the singers in advance of orchestral rehearsals, and the full orchestra comes together to work in Washington before each set of performances in D.C. and New York.
Orchestra for our production of Gretry’s Silvain
Violin I
Jacob Ashworth, Concertmaster
June Huang
Theresa Salomon
Elizabeth Field
Violin II
Keats Dieffenbach, Principal
Natalie Kress
Geza Kordes
C. Anne Loud
Viola
Kyle Miller, Principal
Isaiah Chapman
Cello
Loretta O’Sullivan, Principal
Nancy Jo Snider
David Bakamjian
Flute
Charles Brink, Principal
Immanuel Davis
Oboe
Magaret Owens, Principal
Caroline Giassi
Bassoon
Anna Marsh, Principal
Ben Matus
Contra-Bassoon
Jessica Powell Eig, Principal
Horn
Todd Williams, Principal
Linda Dempf
Featured Orchestra Members
Andrew “Andy” Appel
Andrew “Andy” Appel has played harpsichord with Opera Lafayette since the company’s first seasons of chamber concerts as the Violins of Lafayette at the Corcoran Gallery of Art. As Founder of the Four Nations Ensemble, he provided chamber music opportunities early on, not only for Opera Lafayette’s Artistic Director Ryan Brown, but for many of the instrumentalists who subsequently became principal players of Opera Lafayette. It was with Andy’s inspiration that many of the qualities that define Opera Lafayette were fostered, among them rhythmic suppleness, attention to detail, and a curiosity about the context of each piece of music and how that context could inform our performances.
Claire Jolivet
Claire retired from Opera Lafayette’s Orchestra in 2017. She was the concertmaster of Opera Lafayette's orchestra since Ryan Brown put down his violin to conduct from the podium for the company's production of Gluck's Orphée et Euridice in 2002.