Bizarrerie

JULIA FREDERSDORFF Artistic Director, Baroque violin, piccolo violin

Melbourne-born violinist Julia Fredersdorff studied baroque violin with Lucinda Moon at the Victorian College of the Arts, before travelling to the Netherlands to study with Enrico Gatti at The Royal Conservatorium in The Hague. Based in Paris for close to a decade, Julia freelanced with some of the finest European ensembles, such as Les Talens Lyriques, Les Folies Françoises, Le Concert d’Astrée, Le Parlement de Musique, Ensemble Matheus, Les Paladins, Il Complesso Barocco, New Dutch Academy, Ensemble Aurora and Bach Concentus.

Now resident again in Australia, Julia is the founder and Artistic Director of the Tasmanian baroque ensemble, Van Diemen’s Band. She is a founding member of the chamber ensemble Ironwood, the twice ARIA-nominated baroque trio Latitude 37, and founder and former Artistic Director of the annual Peninsula Summer Music Festival on the Mornington Peninsula. Julia has appeared in major arts festivals around Australia and New Zealand and has toured extensively across Europe, from Reykjavík to Wroclaw, Madeira to Venice.

KARINA SCHMITZ viola d’amore, Baroque viola

American violinist and violist, Karina Schmitz, came to Australia in 2019 and is thrilled to find herself immersed in the rich and vibrant musical scene in her new home. She also appears as principal violist with the Australian Haydn Ensemble and in nineteenth-century period trio Notturno. She has performed with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, the Australian Romantic and Classical Orchestra, Van Diemen’s Band, Salut! Baroque, and Ensemble Galante.

In the United States, Karina was principal violist of Handel & Haydn Society in Boston, principal violist of Apollo’s Fire in Cleveland, principal violist of the Carmel Bach Festival in California, and founding violinist/violist with New York based 17th century ensemble ACRONYM. Karina holds viola performance degrees from New England Conservatory of Music (Boston) and the Cleveland Institute of Music.

SIMON MARTYN-ELLIS gallichon, Baroque guitar

Simon Martyn-Ellis began playing the lute after finding the classical guitar repertoire too restrictive for ensemble performance: continuo collaborations remain a mainstay of his activities.

Simon returned to Australia in August 2019 after 17 years abroad, having lived and worked in first Germany for a decade, and then the United States. You can hear him working within Pinchgut Opera, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Latitude 37, Van Diemen’s Band, the Sydney and Tasmanian Symphony Orchestras, as a founding member of Notturno and Duo Corbetta, along with other small but special collaborations. But really, he just has a great time making music with people, exploring the diversity and richness of the sounds of plucked strings from the 16th to the 19th Centuries.