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Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber may have been the finest violinist of the 17th century. He was also a highly innovative composer whose works -- most notably his sonatas for violin -- have gained new prominence in the performing repertory since the historical performance movement began.

Biber was born in the Bohemian town of Wartenberg (now in the Czech Republic). Little is known of his background or education, although he is believed to have studied in Vienna with the eminent German violinist Johann Heinrich Schmelzer. He began his career playing violin and gamba in the aristocratic courts of Moravia, and is known to have assumed a post in the band belonging to Count Karl of Liechtenstein-Castelcorno at Kromeriz. In 1670, he abandoned this position without permission, and joined the Kapelle in Salzburg, being named Kapellmeister there in 1684. His brilliance and virtuosity on the violin made Biber one of the most renowned soloists in Europe, and in 1690 Emperor Leopold I added the aristocratic prefix "von" to his name. He died at age 59 in Salzburg.

Biber's compositions stand as some of the most startlingly advanced music of the Baroque era. Biber's manuscripts and publications record violin improvisations in unprecedented detail; in his Sonata Representativa, one will find Biber's instrumental impressions of cuckoos, frogs, cats, and marching musketeers. These are supplied with a simple ground bass that provides plenty of room for the soloist to stretch out and show off, but are written at such a high level of difficulty that few violinists attempt to master them. In his "Mystery", or "Rosenkranz" sonatas, Biber makes extensive use of scordatura, violin re-tunings that change the tonal character of the instrument and make "impossible" figurations possible.

Biber was clearly influenced by the Musurgia Universalis, a theoretical work written by German Jesuit scientist and mathematician Athanasius Kircher. First published in 1650, Kircher draws parallels between musical tones, planetary motion, and psychological states of being. Biber's music is strongly affective emotionally, and in works of a programmatic character, such as his orchestral piece Battalia, he attempts to combine both a literal and subjective listening experience. In Battalia, the orchestra is required to play several marching songs in different keys at once -- in a manner similar to the music of Charles Ives -- to indicate eager soldiers of various regiments leading off to battle. A soft, hushed passage at the end of the work represents the result, a somber tableau of battlefield dead.

Biber also composed a number of sacred vocal works; most of these reside easily within the required strictures of the Church. A standout piece is his 15-part requiem, an expressive and harmonically adventurous mass that eschews the sobriety of the text in favor of glorious antiphonal choral textures. Along those same lines, musicologists have established that the anonymous, huge 53-part Missa Salisburgensis is also likely the work of Biber. ~ Uncle Dave Lewis

The Purcell Quartet has become recognized as one of the leading chamber groups in the realm of Baroque music performance. As its name suggests, the group has devoted much effort to championing the chamber works of Henry Purcell, playing and recording a great amount of his output, notably the complete three- and four-part sonatas and the complete pavans. But the group's vast repertory also includes works by J.S. Bach, Corelli, Handel, Vivaldi, Schütz, and many other Baroque composers. In addition, -- and what makes the Purcell players unique -- they have staged operas, such as Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea and have presented large choral works in concert by Bach, including cantatas and masses. They have made over 50 recordings, mostly for the Chandos label.

The Purcell Quartet was founded in London in 1983, but did not give its debut concert until February 14, the following year, at London's St. John's, Smith Square. The group's members then were Robert Woolley (keyboard), Catherine Mackintosh (violin), Elizabeth Wallfisch (second violin), and Richard Boothby (cello; viola da gamba). Only one change in personnel has taken place over the years: violinist Catherine Weiss replaced Wallfisch.

The group had immediate success following its triumphant 1984 debut concert, and within three years turned out six recordings for the Hyperion label, each devoted to a different Baroque composer: Vivaldi, Corelli, Alessandro Scarlatti, C.P.E. Bach, Geminiani, and Marais. In 1987 the ensemble began recording for Chandos Records and has produced more than 40 CD titles for that British label.

By the early '90s, the Purcell Quartet was in great demand, both at home and abroad. Numerous concert tours took the quartet not only throughout the U.K., but across Europe, the U.S., South America, and parts of the Middle East. In 1998 the group traveled to Japan to stage performances of Monteverdi's L'incoronazione di Poppea. Three years later it returned for another important tour, this one featuring a highly successful staging of Monteverdi's L'Orfeo starring Mark Padmore. Other leading vocalists have typically appeared at the Purcell Quartet's opera and concert productions over the years, including Emma Kirkby, Nancy Argenta, Michael Chance, and Peter Harvey.

The Purcell Quartet marked its 20th anniversary in an acclaimed February 2004 concert at Wigmore Hall. The ensemble has remained very active in the recording studio, and among its recordings is the 2006 Chandos CD of Couperin's Les Nations, Vol. 2.

A co-founder of the influential instrumental group Fretwork, William "Bill" Hunt has been a major presence on the British early music scene for many years. He later became a member of the Dunedin Consort.

Hunt matriculated at the Marlborough College boarding school in Marlborough, England, in 1966. He went on to Cambridge University, studying law, languages, and music. He graduated in 1974 and, with the British early music movement strongly on the rise, decided to devote himself to music, and specifically to the viola da gamba and other viols. Hunt landed a spot on a tour of Spain organized by the Taverner Consort and its director, Andrew Parrott. With free time on the tour, Hunt and viol players Richard Campbell and Richard Boothby began to play together and to work on the, at that time, mostly untouched viol repertory. Those sessions were the nucleus of what became Fretwork, which Hunt co-founded in 1985; by then, it had six members, and soon it attracted prestigious vocal guests such as soprano Emma Kirkby and countertenor Michael Chance. Hunt played with Fretwork until 2005 and founded the group's publishing arm in 1989; it was one of the first publishing companies to use computer music notation software, and it continues to flourish, expanding into vocal consort music as well as instrumental music. Since leaving Fretwork in 2005, Hunt has continued to play with the group occasionally, to record with it often, and to serve it as a consultant. In 2007, he joined the Dunedin Consort, remaining a member of that group as of 2020. He has worked as a musicologist with the Magdalena Consort on its recordings of vocal consort music.

Hunt has been in demand as an ensemble recording artist and has appeared on more than 30 albums, not only with Fretwork and the Dunedin Consort but with many other groups. He made his debut on viola da gamba with the English Concert in 1982, on a recording of Bach's Brandenburg Concertos. Most of his recordings since then have been of Renaissance music, with such groups as the Taverner Consort and His Majestys Sagbutts and Cornetts, with whom he appeared on the two volumes of In Chains of Gold, collections of English pre-Restoration verse anthems. The second of these appeared in 2020. ~ James Manheim