Exploring our past seasons: 2019-2024

Each season, we take great care to program, rehearse, and perform concerts that enhance the Washington, DC classical music scene. Please read more about our past festivals below.

2024 Epiphany Festival | Gustav Holst: Beyond the Planets

In 2024, our festival was dedicated to exploring the legacy of Gustav Holst. Though he is most famous for his orchestral suite The Planets, Holst’s legacy as a composer, an educator, and a parent goes far beyond his most famous work. Together, we explored the world of Holst through his lesser-known masterpieces, and works by his contemporaries and students, including his daughter Imogen (including the US premiere of her Three Psalms,) Elizabeth Maconchy, and George Butterworth.

Concert #1: Saturday, January 20th at 7:30 p.m.

An Evening of Song with Laura Choi Stuart and Collin Power

Sopranos Laura Choi Stuart, Amanda Densmoor, and baritone Collin Power join artistic director Andrew Jonathan Welch for an evening of song, including Gustav Holst’s Twelve Songs of Humbert Wolfe and Vedic Hymns and a song cycle by Reena Esmail.

Concert #2: Sunday, January 21st, 3:00 p.m.

The Cloud Messenger and Imogen Holst’s Three Psalms

Gustav Holst’s choral masterwork The Cloud Messenger is presented in a version for chamber orchestra by Joseph Fort. It will be heard alongside the US premiere of his daughter Imogen Holst’s Three Psalms. Mezzo-soprano Gabriela Estephanie Solis joins the Epiphany Festival orchestra and chorus.

2020 Epiphany Festival | Beethoven: Unmasking the iconoclast

In our second season and our final concerts before the pandemic, we joined with artistic organizations across the globe in celebrating the music and legacy of Ludwig van Beethoven. How can a festival built to explore lesser-known works properly explore Beethoven? This challenge motivated us to craft three programs that showcased lesser-explored influences on Beethoven’s ouevre. The outer two performances featured a chamber orchestra and explored the influence of Luigi Cherubini on Beethoven - though he is not often programmed or discussed today, Beethoven regularly referred to Cherubini as the greatest composer alive. Cherubini’s Requiem and his Chant sur la mort de Haydn were heard alongside symphonies by Beethoven and Haydn. Our second performance, always dedicated to art songs, featured lieder by Beethoven and Mozart alongside works for cello and piano. The centerpiece of this recital was a commissioned song by local composer Elisabeth Mehl Greene, Chloe Speaks, which presented a response to Beethoven’s Der Kuss.

2019 Epiphany Festival | Our First Festival

The Epiphany Festival was created in 2019 with the goal of modestly broadening the cultural and musical offerings of Washington DC by offering performances of lesser-known masterworks. Our first iteration of the festival focused on a common problem in programming these works: the size of the ensemble. The DC metro area boasts access to several world-class orchestras alongside access to some of the great vocal and instrumental soloists of our time. Presenters of classical music have difficulty, though, finding occasions to feature works with 6-15 performers. Our first three concerts focused on ensembles of this medium size, and included works by Jennifer Higdon, Franz Schreker, Schoenberg, Mozart, Florent Schmitt, and Johannes Brahms. We invite you to explore these three initial programs below.