Below are the IYBO Artistic Staff for 2022. Staff for 2023 will be announced in the New Year.
Claire Duff, Director
Internationally renowned baroque violinist, Claire Duff is in demand as soloist, chamber musician, leader and director. Her ‘stylish solo violin playing’ (Gramophone) has been described as having ‘all the excitement of a high-wire act’ (The Irish Times). In 2016 she was elected Associate of the Royal Academy of Music, London (ARAM), for her significant contribution to the music profession.
Claire is leader of the Irish Baroque Orchestra with which she regularly performs as soloist and often as director, to critical acclaim. She has led Florilegium, I Fagiolini, English Touring Opera, The Kings Consort and Camerata Kilkenny and co-led the Academy of Ancient Music and The English Concert. Claire has an extensive discography, including a highly acclaimed CD of Bach’s Double Violin Concerto with Monica Huggett and IBO. She is passionate about baroque music and is a fervent exponent of period instrument performance. She is Director of the Irish Youth Baroque Orchestra and teacher of baroque violin at the Royal Irish Academy of Music.
Claire often has solo works composed for her and this year she performed a Jane O’Leary Fantasia as part of a Music Network Bach recital tour with the award-winning French harpsichordist, Benjamin Alard, and a piece for modern and baroque violin composed by Sam Perkins and performed with Diane Hunka as part of the Killaloe Chamber Music Festival.
Malcolm Proud, Continuo (Harpsichord)
Malcolm Proud won first prize at the Edinburgh International Harpsichord Competition in 1982. He has performed at all the major Irish festivals and has toured Finland, Denmark, Holland, UK, Switzerland, Germany, France, Italy, USA., Japan, Canada, Estonia, Latvia, Belgium, Austria and Portugal. In 2016 he gave harpsichord recitals at the National Concert Hall in Dublin, at Fenton House in London playing the Queen’s 1612 Ruckers, at the Cobbe Collection of Historical Keyboard Instruments in Hatchlands, Surrey, and at Handel House in London.
Organist of St Canice’s Cathedral in Kilkenny, his CD of Bach’s Clavierübung III recorded on the Metzler Organ at Stein am Rhein in Switzerland was released in 2008 on the Maya Recordings label.
In 2010 Malcolm Proud played all six of Bach’s Brandenburg Concertos with Sir John Eliot Gardiner’s English Baroque Soloists at the London Proms and the Schleswig-Holstein Festival in Germany. He is co-founder with Swiss violinist Maya Homburger of Camerata Kilkenny and has performed concertos with the Academy of Ancient Music and the European Union Baroque Orchestra.
He has recorded Bach’s 5th Brandenburg Concerto with both the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and the English Baroque Soloists. His most recent recording – J.S. Bach’s Six Partitas for Harpsichord on the Maya Recordings Label – has been critically acclaimed.
Malcolm Proud is supported by Music Network’s Music Capital Scheme, funded by The Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht. Music Network is funded by the Arts Council.
Nathan Sherman, Viola
Nathan Sherman is an American-born viola player currently based in Dublin. From an early age Nathan was drawn to the dark sounds of the viola and has dedicated his life to the exploration of the instrument. Passionate about new music, Nathan has premiered many works and has recorded and broadcast with Ergodos, Crash Ensemble, Kirkos, and Evlana. His album, Totemic with percussionist Alex Petcu received critical acclaim with Nathan’s sound being described as ”rich and raw”-Journal of Music.
Nathan is Artistic Director and violist of Ficino Ensemble, an acclaimed music group that is devoted to the performance of classical and contemporary chamber music. The group recently released a debut recording, Winter, with music by Garrett Sholdice, Maurice Ravel and Johannes Brahms which was hailed as “intelligently programmed and superbly played.”(Classical Ear). The ensemble regularly performs as a string quartet at the National Concert Hall String Quartet Series and will release a second album, Folk Songs in July 2022.
As an orchestral player, Nathan plays with all the orchestras of Ireland and has performed throughout Europe, China, South America, the Kennedy Center (Washington DC), Les Château de Versailles (Paris), Royal Albert Hall (London) and the Palazzo Ducale (Mantova). As a Baroque violist, Nathan regularly appears with the Irish Baroque Orchestra, Camerata Kilkenny and Ensemble Marsyas.
Aoife Nic Athlaoich, Cello
Aoife began her cello studies in the RIAM with Olwen Lewis and later with Nora Gilleece. In 2001 she moved to London to study with Prof. David Strange at RAM and completed her studies under Prof Melissa Phelps at the RCM, London where she graduated with a 1st class Hons degree and was awarded the Stanley Picker Scholarship for her Post Graduate Studies. She was invited to take masterclasses with such eminent cellists as Natalia Gutman, Ralph Kirshbaum, Bernard Greenhouse, Johannes Goritzki and Frans Helmerson.
In 2014 Aoife joined the Irish Chamber Orchestra, with whom she has toured extensively both in Europe and America. Within the ICO she has performed as soloist and chamber musician.
Aoife is widely in demand as a baroque cellist and performs regularly with the Irish Baroque Orchestra, Camerata Kilkenny and Sir. John Elliot Gardiner’s acclaimed Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique. She has given solo recitals at East Cork, Galway and Sligo early music festivals.
She has recorded with the ICO on the Ordeo label and broadcast live from Carnegie Hall, BBC Proms and Wigmore Hall.
She currently teaches cello at RIAM, MTU Cork School of Music and University of Limerick and specializes in baroque cello and chamber music.
Andreas Helm, Woodwind
As oboist and recorder player Andreas Helm is a permanent member of the Capella Leopldina, the Irish Baroque Orchestra, the Baroque Soloists Munich, the Gaechinger Cantorey and the Ensemble Cordia. He also collaborates with the Freiburger Barockorchester, Concerto Köln, Concentus Musicus Wien, Musiciens du Louvre and others. He is also a founding member of the Rossi Piceno Baroque Ensemble and the Ensemble Schikaneders Jugend, which brings Alpine musician manuscripts from the 18th century to life again. For the 2001 and 2002/03 seasons he was invited by the European Union Baroque Orchestra as first oboist and recorder soloist. Together with the conductor Heinz Ferlesch he founded the Originalklangorchester and Consort Barucco, with whom he regularly performs at the Vienna Konzerthaus and the Linzer Brucknerhaus.
As a chamber musician and soloist, he has already won prizes at numerous competitions (including Gradus ad Parnassum and Premio Bonporti). Concert tours have taken him to many European countries and to China, Japan, Mexico, USA, Canada, Singapore and South Africa.
In a leading position, Andreas Helm appears regularly on various occasions, from the oboe he has led Barucco, the Hrvatski Barokni Ansambal, the Norwegian Wind Band, the Cork Baroque Orchestra as well as large baroque wind projects (Music for the Royal Fireworks) of the Austrian music universities.
Recordings include with CPO, Sony, harmonia mundi, Capriccio, Cavalli, ORF, Carus and others. Recent oboe concertos by Vivaldi and Zach with the Baroque Soloists Munich and by Heinichen with the Irish Baroque Orchestra was released.
Andreas Helm is professor for historical oboe instruments at the Music and Art Private University of the City of Vienna and held this position at the Graz University of Art 2014-2019. He also teaches at numerous guest courses and master classes. www.barucco.com / www.schikanedersjugend.at
Elizabeth Vogel, Baroque Flute
Elisabeth was born in Germany and started to play the recorder at the age of five at her local music school. Later on her passion for music – particularly baroque music – led her to enrol for Early Music Studies at the University of Music and Theatre Leipzig. There, she met her teachers Anna Januj (recorder) as well as Marcello Gatti and Anne Freitag (baroque flute). She took part in master classes with Maurice van Lieshout, Dorothee Oberlinger, Barthold Kujken and Nikolaj Ronimus among others. Her interest in folk music also led her to taking lessons in Irish flute and Tin whistle with Alan Doherty.
In 2014 she was awarded the scholarship “Deutschlandstipendium”. During her studies, Elisabeth undertook courses in music education which made her graduate with a pedagocical profile.
She has over 8 years of teaching experience with all ages and in 2018 she coached the traverso players of the Irish Youth Baroque Orchestra. She took part in the folk festival “TFF Rudolstadt”, the “Liv!e” Festival for Improvisation Leipzig and the improvisation festival “Playground” in Weimar. She performed, amongst others, with ensembles such as the Leipziger Barockorchester, Exxential Bach, Irish Baroque Orchestra, the Cork Baroque Players, camerata lipsiensis/ Gewandhaus choir and capella arnestati. Elisabeth graduated from HMT Leipzig with two B.mus., one in baroque flute and one in recorder, both with the grade “very good”.
Elisabeth specializes in music from the 16th until the 18th century, as well as traditional Irish and other types of folk music. Recently she particularly began to explore a fusion of traditional irish music with baroque music with her ensemble “No hard borders”.
Mary Collins, Early Dance
Mary Collins is an Early Dance specialist whose research and teaching approach has inspired musicians to look afresh at the dance music that is at the heart of the baroque repertoire bringing, in turn, a fresh perspective on the great composers of the baroque era. A practitioner and researcher, she has worked with dance, theatre and TV companies as an adviser, choreographer, dancer and actress and tours regularly giving master-classes, lecture-recitals and workshops. A faculty member of Aestas Musica in Croatia, the Austria Barokakademie and, for 26 years, The Ringve International Summer Course in Norway, she regularly collaborates with many of the world’s leading exponents of early music.
Reviving original choreography and gesture for historical performance, Mary promotes a vibrant, multi-disciplinary approach to music making, valued by artists and audiences alike.
A practitioner and researcher, she performs regularly with the London Handel Players and Florilegium, giving master classes, lecture-recitals and workshops to dancers and musicians throughout the world. Mary teaches at the Royal Academy of Music and Royal College of Music in London, also as a guest at the University of Birmingham. She is often invited to work with orchestras, most recently the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and Southbank Sinfonia.
Sabine Volkmann, Feldenkrais
Sabine Volkmann completed her BA course in music 1992 in Nuremberg, Germany and became a flute teacher and performer.
After an Ilse Middendorf breathing therapy workshop in 1986, Sabine explored different body performance methods, including Eutonie, Alexander Technique, Biodynamic Massage, and finished her Feldenkrais training in England in 1994. Since 1993, she has been teaching the Feldenkrais Method with groups and individuals and was a board member of the German Feldenkrais Guild from 1998 – 2002.
In 2001, Sabine moved to Ireland where she started her full-time Feldenkrais practice in Dublin. Since then, she has completed training in Deep Imagery and Hakomi. In 2014, she trained in Reconnective Healing.
In her practice, she synthesises all four methods, depending on the needs of the client. As they all are based on an organic learning process and the self-healing capacity of the body, mind and spirit they complement each other and can mutually support each other’s benefits.
