The women of Schola Antiqua
return "in secret"

The women of Schola Antiqua reunited for their first concert since 2019 with a revival of their popular "Music in Secret" program. Performances took place in Chicago and on the campus of Illinois State University. Featuring guest director Naomi Gregory, this program of convent music journeyed through a half millennium of sounds written for and by nuns. Schola Antiqua’s concert featured some of the earliest known polyphony associated with nuns from an anonymous collection of printed partbooks from 1543. The event included medieval plainchant and early modern choral music, such as that by Sulpitia Cesis, a nun from the northern Italian city of Modena. Gregory also performed keyboard works linked to Italian convents. Guest viola da gamba player Cora Swenson Lee joined the women of the ensemble. 

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