The opportunity to experience one of the finest chamber ensembles not just in the state of Florida, but in the country, can now be seized without traversing Alligator Alley, as the Miami-based Seraphic Fire brings their 2015-2016 season directly to Naples audiences with four concerts at the Moorings Presbyterian Church. For fourteen seasons, Seraphic Fire has been fulfilling their mission to present high-quality performances of under-performed music with cultural significance in South Florida, on tour and on their GRAMMY-nominated recordings. According to Founder and Artistic Director Patrick Dupré Quigley, “Seraphic Fire doesn’t just perform a concert; instead, we create experiences. We help people reach across time and space to touch the fabric of a different era, a different people.”

In 2014, Seraphic Fire began a partnership with the New York-based instrumental ensemble, The Sebastians, who bring their baroque and classical genre expertise, as well as their immaculate execution, to make Seraphic Fire performances even more unique, cohesive and impressive. Naples audiences will have the opportunity to experience this collaboration in the initial concert offering this October, which features a blend of newly-commissioned works and the incomparable Schubert’s Mass in G.

January’s concert will celebrate the American Spiritual in a program featuring Reginald Mobley, Countertenor while Julian Wachner, Director of Music at Trinity Wall Street, New York, will join Seraphic Fire in March for a program encompassing the 20th Century music of the Americas, including works by Heitor Villa-Lobos, Alberto Ginastera, Morten Lauridsen, and Mr. Wachner, himself. The inaugural Naples season concludes with Elizabethan music by the renaissance composer William Byrd.

Seraphic Fire’s Naples Concert Series at Moorings Presbyterian Church includes:

October 15, 2015: Schubert: Mass in G

Seraphic Fire presents a combination of contemporary and canon: a newly-commissioned work by young American composer Jake Runestad, along with Franz Schubert’s Mass in G. Featuring The Sebastians. Conducted by Patrick Dupré Quigley.

January 14, 2016: The Spiritual: America’s First Art Form

From the hills of Appalachia, to the small African-American churches of the Deep South, the American Spiritual is, today, America’s first home-grown musical art form. From the plaintive sounds of Amazing Grace and Come thou Fount of Every Blessing to the unbridled joy of Ev’ry Time I Feel the Spirit, the American Spiritual gets to the very essence of our national patrimony. Seraphic Fire will explore this compelling genre in depth, illuminating both familiar tunes and soon-to-be favorites. Featuring Reginald Mobley, Countertenor. Conducted by Patrick Dupré Quigley.

March 10, 2016: A Single Rose: Modernism in the Americas, Julian Wachner, guest conductor

Morten Lauridsen’s Chansons de Roses (Rose Songs) headline this in-depth exploration of musical modernism in the Americas. From Lauridsen to South American composers such as Heitor Villa-Lobos and Alberto Ginastera, each created music that elegantly combined the native tunes of their homelands with more traditional European styles. Mr. Wachner will also conduct his own compositions, and lead the Lauridsen from the piano.

May 12, 2016: William Byrd: The English Cathedral

Well known as a favorite of Queen Elizabeth, William Byrd led a dual life. In public, he composed glorious music for the reformed English church; in private, he produced intimate, divine works of devotion for private worship by England’s Catholics. Well aware of the Catholic sympathies of Byrd and his teacher, Thomas Tallis, Elizabeth was nonetheless so taken with the men and their work that she granted them a monopoly on music publishing in the realm. William Byrd’s music still stands as a monument to the cultural renaissance under the reign of Elizabeth I. Conducted by Patrick Dupré Quigley.

Purchase tickets at seraphicfire.org/naples.