The Newberry Consort and Haymarket Opera Present ‘Euridice,’ Oldest Surviving Opera, Oct. 24-25

CHICAGO — Two treasured Chicago music institutions—Haymarket Opera Company and The Newberry Consort—are excited to present Jacopo Peri’s landmark work, Euridice, the oldest surviving opera, on Oct. 24 at 7 p.m. at the Art Institute of Chicago and on Oct. 25 at 3 p.m. at the Music Institute of Chicago in Evanston.

This concert-style presentation will feature a cast of celebrated artists as well as an orchestra of expert period instrumentalists assembled from within Chicago’s flourishing early music scene and beyond.

Jacopo Peri holds a monumental place in the history of opera as its pioneering figure, often called the "father of opera." Living at the dawn of the Baroque era, Peri laid the foundation for the development of opera as a genre capable of exploring profound human emotions and stories, influencing generations of composers from Monteverdi to Handel and beyond.

Composed to serve as just one of several entertainments organized to celebrate the marriage of Maria de Medici to Henri IV of France, Euridice premiered in the year 1600 to a private audience of around 200 specially invited guests. Though it was a highly experimental work in its day, Euridice laid the groundwork for many well-known conventions essential to opera’s international success in our time. As emotionally touching as it was innovative, the proof of Euridice’s power to move as well as to dazzle audiences can be seen not only throughout the history of opera, but also in the pervasive modern art mediums of television and cinema.

Euridice transports the listener to a mythical world exploring the intriguing intersections of love, magic, and power, to tell an arresting musical story on a scale befitting a Medici wedding.

Soprano Erica Schuller and tenor Scott J. Brunscheen will star as the fated lovers Euridice and Orfeo, while the rest of the cast will include sopranos Hannah De Priest and Véronique Filloux, mezzo-soprano Christine Boddicker, alto Ryan Belongie, tenors Brian Skoog and Michael St. Peter, bass-baritone Jonathan Woody, and bass Anthony Reed.

The orchestra will include 16 musicians playing 17th-century instruments, including Kiri Tollaksen and Bill Baxtresser on cornetti; Liza Malamut, Ben David Aronson and Garrett Lahr on sackbuts; Marty Davids and Jeri-Lou Zike on violins; Lisette Kielson and Laura Osterlund Klehr on recorders; Claire Happel-Ashe on harp; Jacob Reed on organ; Jason Moy on harpsichord; Lucas Harris and Brandon Acker on theorbos; Adrienne Hyde on lirone, and Craig Trompeter on viol.

Led by Haymarket and Newberry artistic directors Craig Trompeter and Liza Malamut, Haymarket General Director Chase Hopkins, and Newberry Consort Executive Director Ben David Aronson, the companies’ collaborative work on this project began in the summer of 2024.

“I am tremendously excited for this collaboration,” said Malamut, artistic director of The Newberry Consort. “The combination of our vocal and instrumental forces is an incredible opportunity to highlight two of Chicago’s most storied early music groups, and to create a production that is musically captivating and greater than the sum of its parts.”

The landmark opera had its American premiere at the University of Chicago in 1967. That performance was directed by musicologist Howard Mayer Brown, who also published a modern edition of the work in 1981. “Chicago’s early music legacy continues on in both The Newberry Consort and Haymarket,” said Hopkins. “Our collaboration will bring together two organizations dedicated to historically informed performance techniques, style, and instrumentation. I am thrilled to co-produce this important piece with friends at The Newberry Consort, in order to provide audiences with the rare chance to hear early music performed by our combined forces and indeed, the earliest opera!”

Jacopo Peri’s Euridice

The Newberry Consort and Haymarket Opera present a concert production of Jacopo Peri’s landmark opera, Euridice.

Friday, Oct. 24, 2025 at 7 p.m. at Fullerton Hall at the Art Institute of Chicago, 111 S. Michigan Ave. Chicago

Saturday, Oct. 25, 2025 at 3 p.m. at Nichols Concert Hall, 1490 Chicago Ave., Evanston

Tickets: $80 for preferred seating, $65 for general admission, $25 for affordable access tickets, $10 for students with a valid student ID, and free for children 16 and under.

To purchase tickets please visit www.newberryconsort.org.

About The Newberry Consort:

The Newberry Consort brings together singers and instrumentalists of the highest caliber to create historically informed performances of music from the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, the Baroque, and beyond. By integrating historical performance and research with contemporary themes and multimedia, we inspire audiences, musicians, and scholars by providing a window into earlier times and diverse cultures. The Consort continues to uplift Chicago’s early music community through mentorships, teaching, and engagement of local artists.

About Haymarket Opera Company:

Haymarket Opera Company contributes to the diverse and culturally vibrant artistic community of Chicago and the Midwest through the historically informed presentation of opera and oratorio from the 17th and 18th centuries, including many Chicago and U.S. premieres. Haymarket takes its name from both Chicago’s Haymarket Affair of 1886 which gave focus to the world-wide labor movement, and from the King’s Theatre in the Haymarket District of London where Handel produced his Italian operas.