Arcangelo at LHF

Arcangelo opened the London Handel Festival 2025 in style with its debut performance as Principal Ensemble in Residence, under the direction of Jonathan Cohen in his debut as Artistic Adviser. The massed orchestral and choral forces were joined by a star-studded line-up of international soloists including Louise Alder, Paulina Francisco, Stuart Jackson and Adam Plachetka to perform one of Handel’s most inventive, unique, and inspiring works.

Based on the imaginative poetry of John Milton, Handel’s L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato is a breathtaking collision of darkness and light, innocence and experience: a celebration of the wonders of nature and the mysteries of life.

At this special recital in the beautiful setting of the Picture Gallery at the Foundling Museum, Arcangelo Artistic Director Jonathan Cohen introduced the five members of Arcangelo’s 2024-26 New Ensemblists programme: violinists Leo Appel (UK) and Carmen Lavada Johnson-Pájaro (USA), violist Jaume Pueyo Solà (ES), cellist Martin Egidi (CH) and bassoonist Francisco Javier Sánchez Castillo (ES).

Created in 2020, the Arcangelo New Ensemblists programme has so far offered breakthrough career support to 11 young musicians specialised in period performance at the crucial transition point between conservatoire and the profession. 

For the 2025 Celebrity Recital, Arcangelo and Jonathan Cohen were joined by Hungarian soprano Emőke Baráth. 

Following her 2011 breakthrough as winner of the Second International Singing Competition for Baroque Opera in Innsbruck, and as winner of the Grand Prix of the Verbier Festival Academy, Baráth has established herself as one of the leading lights of the new generation of Baroque voices, appearing with Il Pomo d’Oro, Europa Galante, Le Concert d’Astrée, Les Arts Florissants, Les Musiciens du Louvre, Concerto Köln, Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, and on recordings including the critically-acclaimed Handel recital Dualità (2022), conducted by Philippe Jaroussky.