Juilliard415 with conductor Nicholas McGegan

The ensemble, which takes its name from the pitch commonly accepted for the performance of Baroque music (A=415), performs a wide range of repertoire in a number of different guises, with as few as four or five players for intimate chamber music programs, to as many as 30 for major cornerstones of the repertoire.

Among the many distinguished guests who have led Juilliard415 are such renowned musicians as William Christie, Ton Koopman, Harry Bicket, Nicholas McGegan, Christopher Hogwood, and Monica Huggett. In April 2011, the ensemble made its Carnegie Hall debut accompanying David Daniels and Dorothea Röschmann in a program of Handel arias, a concert that was cited as one of the 10 best of the season by the New York Times. A performance in 2012 of Handel’s Il trionfo del tempo e del disinganno under the baton of William Christie earned this same distinction.

Touring is an important component of Juilliard415’s profile. The ensemble has performed along the East Coast, with notable presentations by the Virginia Arts Festival, the Tropical Baroque Music Festival in Miami, and the Juilliard in Aiken festival in South Carolina. With its frequent musical collaborator, Yale University’s Institute of Sacred Music, Juilliard415 has toured extensively in Italy, Japan, Singapore, and Burma under the direction of Masaaki Suzuki. In the 2014-15 season, Yale and Juilliard will team up again for performances of Beethoven, Haydn, and Zelenka in New York, Boston, New Haven, and throughout the United Kingdom. Members of Juilliard415 have twice been featured as in-studio guests on WQXR-FM, New York Public Radio and its performance of Bach’s St. John Passion with the Yale Institute of Sacred Music was broadcast by the station in April 2014.

He has been Music Director of Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra for 28 years, and was Artistic Director of the International Handel Festival Göttingen for 20 years (1991–2011). Beginning in the 2013-14 season he took on the title of Principal Guest Conductor of the Pasadena Symphony, and in 2014 becomes Artist in Association with Australia’s Adelaide Symphony. His approach to period style — intelligent, infused with joy and never dogmatic — has led to appearances with major orchestras where his programs often mingle Baroque with later works. He is also at home in opera houses; in addition to shining new light on close to twenty Handel operas as the Artistic Director and conductor at the Gottingen Festival, he has led productions for leading companies including Covent Garden, San Francisco, Santa Fe and Washington. He was Principal Conductor at Sweden’s famed Drottningholm Theatre from 1993-1996.

English-born Nicholas McGegan was educated at Cambridge and Oxford. He was made an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) “for services to music overseas.” Other awards include the Halle Handel Prize; the Order of Merit of the State of Lower Saxony (Germany); the Medal of Honour of the City of Göttingen, and a declaration of Nicholas McGegan Day, by the Mayor of San Francisco in recognition of his work with Philharmonia Baroque. In 2013, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music awarded him an honorary degree of Doctor of Music. His extensive discography includes seven recent releases on Philharmonia Baroque’s label, Philharmonia Baroque Productions (PBP), including Brahms Serenades; Beethoven Symphonies nos. 4 and 7; Berlioz Les Nuits d’été and Handel arias with Lorraine Hunt Lieberson; Haydn Symphonies nos. 88, 101 and 104 (nominated for a GRAMMY® Award); Vivaldi The Four Seasons and other concerti with violinist Elizabeth Blumenstock, and Handel’s Atalanta and Handel’s Teseo, both featuring soprano Dominique Labelle.