Thank you for supporting the Davis Senior High School Baroque Ensemble Spain Tour
June 25-July 5, 2026
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Artist Profiles
Concert Master Kiran Ming Thole
Concert Master Kiran Ming Thole is a sophomore at Davis High School. He started playing violin at the age of nine, being taught by David and Audinga Jacobson. He later studied under Victor Romasevich, who he still studies with to this day. He also studies composition under Davide Verotta for five years. He has won second and third places in the Pacific Musical Society Composition Competition and has had one of his works premiered previously at the Holmes Finale Concert. He was previously concertmaster of the Holmes Advanced Orchestra and is currently concertmaster of the Davis High School Baroque Ensemble. He also is a member of the Davis High School String Tutoring program in which he tutors one student. He has participated in many chamber music ensembles in and outside of the school program. In his free time, he enjoys listening to music, practicing, and reading. His favourite composers are Karol Szymanowski, Bela Bartok, J.S. Bach, and Dimitri Shostakovich
Harpsichord Soloist Joseph Gonzalez
Soloist Joseph Gonzalez just completed his senior year at Davis High in Davis, California, and has been an active keyboardist since he was 4 years old. He was first taught piano by Joan Chambers, then later working under Dr. Lorna Peters on the harpsichord during his time with the DHS Baroque Ensemble. He has accompanied the DHS Symphony, performed Chopin’s Piano Concerto No. 2 in F minor in the Davis High Concerto Competition, and played the jazz keyboard with the DHS Jazz Band. Joseph also teaches piano and coaches swimming lessons, and loves to backpack in the Sierra Nevadas. In the fall, he will be studying Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences at the University of California San Diego.
Guest Artist Dr. Cathie Apple
Guest Artist Dr. Cathie Apple is the Flute Instructor at Sacramento State’s School of Music and Principal Flutist with the North State Symphony. She is also one of the founders of Citywater new music ensemble and a founding member of Sinfonia Spirituosa baroque ensemble.
An avid supporter of new music, Cathie has commissioned and/or premiered many works for flute and various chamber ensembles, has collaborated with composers such as Clare Shore, Nicholas Deyoe, Brent Chancellor, Derek Keller, Nell Shaw Cohen, Ryan Suleiman, Josiah Catalan, and Sunny Knable, and regularly performs on the Festival of New American Music. She has been a commissioning member of the Flute New Music Consortium since 2019, and recently joined consortiums for composers Juri Seo and Alan Theisen.
Along with her specialization in modern music, Dr. Apple performs regularly on traverso, with baroque ensembles Sinfonia Spirituosa and the Sacramento Baroque Soloists. Her traverso is made by Martin Wenner and is modeled after a mid-18th century flute designed by Italian flute-maker Carlo Palanca.
Cathie maintains a private teaching studio in Sacramento and for over a decade was the flute instructor at the Pacific Institute of Music in Folsom. Previous appointments include second flutist with the Las Vegas Philharmonic and adjunct faculty at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and Southern Utah University. While in Las Vegas, Cathie founded NEXTET new music ensemble, and performed with them at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival.
Cathie earned her Doctorate from the University of Michigan, where she studied with Amy Porter. While in Michigan, Cathie also taught at Interlochen Arts Camp and was the yoga instructor for Amy Porter’s Anatomy of Sound workshop.
In addition to maintaining a busy teaching and performing schedule, Cathie is a fitness instructor and personal trainer, and enjoys doing CrossFit, triathlons, obstacle races, and going on long backpacking trips to recharge her batteries.
Guest Artist Timothy Stanley
Guest Artist Cellist Timothy Stanley performs regularly with Northern California orchestras, symphonies, opera companies and musical theaters, as well as area baroque ensembles Sinfonia Spirituosa and Sacramento Baroque Soloists. He is a founding member of Citywater, a modern chamber music sextet.
Timothy earned his Bachelor in Music degree from the University of Nevada at Las Vegas, and his Master’s in Cello Performance from Sacramento State, where his primary teachers were Dr. Andrew Smith and Andrew Luchansky. In addition to teaching private cello and violin lessons, he runs the strings program at Camellia Waldorf School. He is also on faculty at Sacramento State’s School of Music, where he teaches string pedagogy, music theory, and runs the String Project, which provides low-cost music training to Sacramento-area elementary school children, while allowing undergraduate and graduate music students to refine their roles as professional string teachers.
When not behind his cello or in front of a room full of young musicians, Tim can be found racing triathlon of all distances, marathon and ultramarathon footraces, open water swim events, century bike rides or backpacking with his partner, flutist Cathie Apple and their pit-bull Pepper.
History of the Davis Senior High School Baroque Ensemble
History of the Davis Senior High School Baroque Ensemble
The Creation of the First US Public High School Baroque Ensemble
At present, the DHS Orchestra Program has grown four times its original size in the past 20 years since the hiring of Angelo Moreno in 2000, Director of Orchestras at Davis Senior High School. By 2008, the program had developed into 2 groups: the “DHS Chamber Orchestra,” a non-auditioned string orchestra including violin, viola, cello, Bass, with 55 students, and the “DHS Symphony Orchestra,” an auditioned full symphonic orchestra including woodwind, brass, percussion, and stringed instruments, with 75 students, making a total of 130 students between the two groups. The growth at the High School has contributed to the growth at the elementary school and junior high level music programs, and the positive continuation rate of orchestra students from 7th grade to 12th grade. As the two orchestras continued to grow, there came the need for a third orchestral ensemble. Like a Jazz band for a band program or a Madrigal Choir for a choral program, the DHS Baroque Ensemble became a natural extension of the DHS Orchestra Program as well as the second audition orchestra at DHS. This group provides students the opportunity to focus on Baroque music, Baroque performance practices, and master technique skills on period-style instruments in a smaller ensemble. The period-style instruments allow the unique style of the era to be further developed, making the overall performance experience more historically accurate and engaging for the student musicians. The DHSBE also allows orchestral students the ability to access a rich and diverse wealth of orchestral literature unique to the development of music as we know it today, which was not possible within the organization of the orchestra program before the creation of the group.
The DHS Baroque Ensemble was featured in several national publications including “Symphony Magazine-Online”, “Early Music Magazine”, “Strings Magazine”, “Teaching Music Magazine”, and the “California Music Educators Association-Online”, for its unique nature and the model it represents for what is possible in the development of other public music programs since the DHS Baroque Ensemble is the first group of its kind at the High School level in the USA.
Without the support of the school administration, district administrators, and the school board, this new course would not have been possible. The district supported the course by passing the course proposal unanimously and allowing the DHS Music Department to implement the DHS Baroque Ensemble into the DHS Orchestra Program. Unfortunately, there were no grants or monetary support from the district beyond teacher FTE. It costs about $12,000 to convert all the instruments and purchase the Baroque Bows for 20 violins, 6 violas, 6 cellos, and two basses. Doing half conversions saved us from having to purchase all new instruments. The director used the best instruments in the school district collection that had been donated over many years. The half conversion included: removing the chin rests, adding baroque tailpieces and baroque bridges, adding gut strings to all the instruments, and purchasing new music specifically for this ensemble. The director also added Precision Tuners to all the instruments because gut strings must be tuned frequently. Students had a hard time getting perfectly in tune with the regular peg tuners. The precision tuners have made a world of difference. The money came from the parents and the many community donations made to our Orchestra Boosters over the years. Our Booster group financially allowed this new group to start well equipped with period-style instruments, including a professional-level John Phillips (1991) Harpsichord and style-appropriate music. We have since acquired a wonderful Baroque Chamber Organ, which adds to the diversity of our continuo sound. The orchestra students earned the creation of this course and sealed the commitment of the School District with their continuously climbing enrollment numbers, commitment to the program, and love for playing orchestral music.
It should be noted that the DHSBE has received vital support from the UCD Music department and was inspired by UCD Baroque Ensemble Directors Phebe Craig and Michael Sand, musical mentors of Angelo Moreno. Routinely, Phebe Craig generously shares her harpsichord expertise by coming to DHS to coach the harpsichord students individually and within the group rehearsal. The group is also privileged to have had Richard Webb, a former member of the Academy of Ancient Music, as a continuo coach for lower strings. Richard is also a wonderful artistic consultant and resource, as well as a group dynamics coach.
The group has collaborated with the UCD Baroque Ensemble directed by Michael Sand and Phebe Craig, the CSUS Camerata Capistrano Directed by Lorna Peters, UC Berkeley Baroque Ensemble Director Davitt Moroney, Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra members Carla Moore, Mia Silverstein, Robert Howard, Elizabeth Blumenstock, and American Bach Soloists member Katherine Heater. Most notably in 2014, 2017, and 2022, the DHSBE was honored to have Rachel Barton Pine as our guest soloist. We presented our Virtual Baroque video performance featuring Rachel Barton Pine and her daughter, Sylvia Pine, in June 2020. The DHS Baroque Ensemble made its debut on the main stage at the 2014 Berkeley Baroque Festival and is proud and honored to have been invited back to the main stage in 2017 and again in 2020 EMA Virtual Baroque Festival.
In June of 2017, the DHSBE accomplished its second major international tour, the first one being in 2014 to Italy for 10 days. The 2017 tour was 14 days,s starting in Vienna and ending in Italy. The group performed in historically significant Baroque Cathedrals, major cities including Vienna, Eisenstadt, Salzburg, Wattens, Innsbruck, Venice, Padua, Cremona, Lucca, Montecatini, Florence, and Rome. The group had planned to return to Europe in June 2020 for a 14-day tour to England, Belgium, and France.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, travel bans, and school closures, our much-anticipated European tour was unfortunately canceled. We are so thankful to all our supporters for their contributions and well-wishes. The students were devastated during this time of separation from one another and the loss of all they had worked toward in 2020, but they were strong and resilient and came back to the concert stage better than ever in 2021-22 and were able to return to Europe to share our music once again with all of our European friends in England, Belgium, and France! We are very excited about our tour to Spain in June 2026, where we can once again enjoy working to achieve new musical heights and perform in some of the most beautiful venues in the world.
Program Notes
Battalia Imperiale by Domenico Zipoli
Domenico Zipoli's Battalia Imperiale is a three-movement work comprising Battalia Imperiale, Battalia Dolorosa, and Battalia Furiosa, and it belongs to the long Baroque tradition of battaglia, a form of Baroque programme music imitating a battle through instrumental depiction of conflict. The three movements trace a dramatic arc through the emotional stages of warfare: the Imperiale opens with a commanding, march-like character built on sharp rhythmic motifs and fanfare figures evoking military pageantry, accentuated by powerful percussion that gives it particular energy and force. The Dolorosa then pivots into something mournful and elegiac, dwelling on the grief of battle's aftermath through lyrical, sighing melodic lines characteristic of the Baroque affetto of sorrow. Finally, the Furiosa erupts with frantic rhythmic drive and turbulent figuration, embodying the chaos and rage of combat itself. Together the three movements use contrasting effects - majesty, grief, then fury to paint not just the spectacle of war but its emotional interior, and critics have noted that the work's tone-painting rivals anything by Vivaldi in its vividness and drama.
-Henry Rosendale
Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, Comédie-Ballet, Op. 2 No. 3 by Jean-Baptiste Lully
The composer of Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, Jean-Baptiste Lully (1632-1687), was an Italian-born French composer who worked under King Louis XIV as a court musician before quickly rising through the ranks to become the Music Master to the royal family (which officially cemented him as the king’s go-to composer for dance music) - just one of the countless honors and positions the King rewarded him with during his career. Lully was close friends with Louis XIV, having met him when they performed alongside each other in the Ballet Royal de la Nuit, and this relationship shaped many aspects of his life and work, as Louis not only honored him and raised Lully’s status and influence but also commissioned countless productions, giving shape to Lully’s sizeable body of work. In his life, Lully established multiple stylistic conventions that became trademarks of French Baroque music (such as the form of the French overture), invented several new dances (including the popular minuet), and introduced new ideas and ways of doing things which revolutionized the performing arts (as when he became the first to bring female dancers to the stage). Beginning in 1662, he was imitated by composers throughout Europe and completely controlled court music in France, which can be seen in the popular adoption of a chaconne for final movements after Lully did in many of his operas. In fact, Lully’s impact on operatic style was such that he is now considered the founder of opera. Lully’s passion and talent for music is seen in every aspect of his legacy, including his dramatic exit from life: death by infection from a foot wound, which he acquired by accidentally stabbing himself with the large staff he used to conduct his orchestras.
Under the instruction of King Louis XIV, Lully composed several court dances, ballets, and operas, many of which he collaborated with celebrities of his time such as Philippe Quinault and Molière on. It was with Molière that Lully worked on Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme (“The Middle-Class Gentleman,” “The Would-Be Gentleman,” or “The Bourgeois Gentleman”) which is a comédie-ballet - a type of stage production which combines a traditional comedy with interludes of instrumental music, dancing, and singing that was very popular in the late 17th century. Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme follows a traditional five-act structure, with the play being written by Molière and all the music being composed by Lully. It is a satirical work following a middle-class man trying to become an aristocratic gentleman who constantly makes a fool of himself, and highlights the flaws of both the middle class and the aristocracy while warning the audience about the consequences of trying to become something you are not. This wasn’t the sole purpose of the work, though; Louis XIV commissioned it in 1670 after hosting an envoy from the Ottoman Empire. The French and the Ottoman Empire were already rivals, competing with each other over favorable trade deals and conditions and geopolitical supremacy, but because Louis XIV was infuriated by snobbery he perceived during the envoy’s visit to Paris, he wished to mock Turkish and Islamic culture. Through the commission which resulted in Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme, Louis XIV was able to express his contempt in a playful and subtle way. The veiled feelings of the king are most clearly expressed towards the end of Act IV during the “Turkish” ceremony, which is highly exoticised in order to fulfill King Louis XIV’s intent. Because the story is originally told as a comedie-ballet in which Lully’s music played a critical role in the storytelling and emotional impact of the work, Lully’s music from the production displays an immense range of mood, color, and feeling. Even when isolated from the play and dances as it often is in modern performances, the vibrant and powerful emotions in the music can still be felt deeply. Whether the romantic, joyful sensitivity of a dance or the bold, stately passion of a march from the Ceremony of the Turks, each movement from Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme portrays an aspect of the human experience and a piece of a story whose power reaches through time
-Hannah Hoch
Musica Notturna Delle Strade Di Madrid, Op. 30, No. 6. by Luigi Boccherini
Musica Notturna delle Strade di Madrid offers a snapshot of life in 18th-century Madrid after dark. Through a series
of short movements, from distant church bells to lively street scenes and a steady military retreat, Boccherini captures
the rhythm and character of the city. Each section reflects a different moment, blending elegance with everyday life and
creating a vivid sense of place.
Harpsichord Concerto in G Minor, BWV 1058, Mo. II and III, by Johann Sebastian Bach
In 1723, Johann Sebastian Bach moved to Leipzig, a city he would reside in until he died 23 years later. Among his many positions in Leipzig (including composing weekly cantatas for the four churches whose music he directed) was the director of the Leipzig Collegium Musicum, a musical society that performed mostly in coffee houses. It was for this society that Bach composed the G Minor Harpsichord Concerto in the late 1730s. He adapted it from an earlier violin concerto in A minor, fitting it to the two hands and idioms of the harpsichord. It is a concerto in the typical Baroque style, featuring three movements in a slow-fast-slow arrangement. Unlike later classical and romantic concertos, the soloist’s part does not contrast with the orchestra’s, creating an organic and blended sound. Often, the soloist plays exactly with the orchestra, with the right hand playing the violin part, and the left playing the continuo.
The second movement is in B-flat major, the relative major of G minor. Set over a walking pace pulsing bass line, the harpsichord develops and elaborates a simple chordal motive that recurs several times throughout the movement as Bach modulates through different keys.
Back in G minor, the explosive finale is a gigue set in an unusual 9/8 meter. From the first fugal tutti, the energy never fades. This movement has the most dense contrapuntal and extreme virtuosic action of the entire concerto, all at breathtaking speeds. It is here that we see Bach’s signature mastery of both rhythm and harmony galloping through technical precision and architectural perfection to an urgent and lively ending.
-Joseph Gonzalez
La Follia, from Suonate da Camera a tre, Op. 1 by Antonio Vivaldi
Antonio Vivaldi (4 March 1678 – 28 July 1741), was an Italian composer known best for his concertos, including the Four Seasons. Born in Venice, he learned the violin at an early age, and began teaching music at an orphanage at the age of 25.
Although Vivaldi had many original compositions, La Folia is not one of them; in fact, many other composers including Corelli and Scarlatti had composed variations upon the Iberian theme, which originated in the 15th century.
La Folia, which translates to “madness,” begins with a slow and simple chord progression and quickly complicates. Unlike many other Baroque pieces, La Folia is built around a series of variations upon the original melody, which become increasingly energetic. The melody, harmony, and bassline captivate listeners, with the distinctly Baroque ornamentation and rhythm feeling almost alien when compared with later classical music.
As history’s longest enduring musical tune, La Folia continues to fascinate audiences—whether in grand European cathedrals, or our own Brunelle Hall—and is one of the most frenetic yet beautiful pieces of the Baroque era.
-Kyle Inceoglu
Fandango, by Domenico Scarlatti
Domenico Scarlatti was born in Naples, Italy, in 1685. The son of successful vocal composer Alessandro Scarlatti, he was exposed to music from a young age and encouraged to pursue composing. While originally composing operatic and vocal pieces, he is best known for the 555 sonatas he wrote towards the end of his life. Of these, ten are written for the violin, three for the organ, and the rest for harpsichord. He held a variety of prestigious positions in the earlier stages of his career, such as being the musical director of the Julian Chapel at St. Peter’s Cathedral from 1714 to 1719, but he held most of these positions for only a couple of years. In 1714, he composed a cantata for the Portuguese embassy honoring the Portuguese crown prince, marking the beginning of his prominence in the aristocratic societies of Portugal and Spain. By 1720, Scarlatti was the musical director to King John V of Portugal and the music master to the king’s brother, Don Antonio, as well as Princess Maria Bárbara de Bragança. When Maria Bárbara married the crown prince of Spain, Scarlatti moved with her to Spain, where he became immersed in Spanish music and began to imitate and draw inspiration from common elements of folk and popular Spanish music.
One Spanish tradition that became popular in music and among the aristocracy during his time was the fandango. Written as a couple’s dance in triple meter (often ¾), it stems from Andalusian folk tradition and was viewed as “exotic” by the Spanish upper class in the early to mid-18th Century. Fandango dance music was often accompanied by castanets, guitar, singing, and traditional hand clapping, with many fandango pieces beginning slower and accelerating. While considered scandalous at first, the passionate fandango dance and music grew in popularity at the beginning of the 18th Century, becoming a trend in Spanish courts. Because of this popularity among the aristocracy, the fandango had an immense influence on the development of classical music and flamenco dancing. Scarlatti, as a member of the Spanish royal court, was exposed to this tradition of music frequently and alluded to it in several of his sonatas by incorporating the fandango's stylistic, musical, and rhythmic elements into his compositions. His appreciation for 18th-century Spanish traditional music and the fire of the fandango dance are showcased in his use of repetitive rhythmic patterns, triple meter, and pizzicato chords that mimic a strummed guitar to echo traditional elements of a fandango in his own composition.
-Hannah Hoch
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