This website provides news and updates pertaining to activities, concerts, and recitals pertaining to music prior to 1800 at FIU’s Herbert and Nicole Wertheim Performing Arts Center. Early music is an integral component of the music major experience at FIU. For instance, all undergraduate music majors are exposed to live lute performances in class and on recitals that include lute, theorbo, harpsichord, and chamber orchestra. All graduate performance majors are required to take MUH 6937 Special Topics in Music History, a seminar with rotating topics usually relating to early music, such as Performance Styles, Performance Practice, Performance Styles & Practice, Tunings & Temperaments, Baroque Music, et al. In each iteration of the course, our students learn how to maintain and tune our outstanding harpsichord and chamber organ.
From 2004–2017, the School of Music offered a formalized early music experience through our early music ensemble, Collegium Musicum. Since then, the School of Music has experienced significant growth in faculty, required course offerings, and the graduate program, all of which have made it challenging to offer Collegium Musicum on a consistent basis. As such, the Collegium Musicum pages here can be considered archival. Nevertheless, FIU’s students and ensembles are still able to experience early music through their established ensembles and recitals accompanied by lute, theorbo, harpsichord, or chamber organ, supported by one of the State’s largest collections of replicas of early instruments in the State of Florida, including a full set of Baroque bows frequently used by the FIU Orchestra and students on their recitals.
Early music guest artists and academics who have provided concerts, special classes, and master classes include the Baltimore Consort, the Boston Early Music Festival Opera, Ruckus, Hopkinson Smith, Stewart Carter, Anthony Newman, Victor Coelho, Robert Crowe, Alison Crum and Roy Marks, and Jose Vazquez.
You can read more about Early Music at FIU by exploring the many menu items this website has to offer, and our homepage keeps you up-to-date with our latest activities. We look forward to seeing you at our next event. Should you wish to be added to our email notification list, please send your contact information to Dr. Dolata at dolata@fiu.edu.