Saturday, September 26th
St. Nicholas Church, 8:00 PM
Antiphonus
Tomislav Fačini, artistic leadership
Quinta Essentia
Stjepan Nodilo, oboe solo and artistic leadership
Mislav Lucić, tenor
Franko Klisović, countertenor
Krešimir Stražanac, bass
Anabela Barić, soprano
Monika Cerovčec, soprano
Martina Borse, alt
Franko Klisović, countertenor
Siniša Galović, tenor
Mislav Lucić, tenor
Tomislav Fačini, bass
Krešimir Stražanac, bass
Stjepan Nodilo, oboe
Gabriel Gramesc, oboe
Bojan Čićić, violin
Simone Pirri, violin
Hiwote Tadesse, viola
Nika Zlatarić, cello
Fran Petrač, violone
David Douçot d`Ortega, bassoon
Izidor Erazem Grafenauer, theorbo and Baroque guitar
Franjo Bilić, harpsichord and organ
From the Breath of the Earth to the Sky!
Giovanni Benedetto Platti
Concerto for oboe in G minor, I 47
Allegro – Largo – Allegro
Johan Sebastian Bach
Jesu, meine Freude, BWV 227
Jesu, meine Freude
Es ist nun nichts Verdammliches
Unter deinem Schirmen
Denn das Gesetz
Trotz dem alten Drachen
Ihr aber seid nicht fleischlich
Weg mit allen Schätzen
So aber Christus in euch ist
Gute Nacht, o Wesen
So nun der Geist
Weicht, ihr Trauergeister
Johan Sebastian Bach
Lutheran Mass in G minor, BWV 235
Kyrie eleison - Christe eleison - Kyrie eleison
Gloria in excelsis
Gratias
Domine Fili
Quo tollis. Quoniam
Cum sancto Spiritu
Founded in 2008, Antiphonus is today regarded as one of Croatia's leading ensembles specialising in vocal music spanning the period from the Middle Ages to the present day. At the heart of its artistic activity are carefully conceived concert programmes that embrace a wide-ranging repertoire, from Gregorian chant, organum, madrigals and motets to oratorios, opera and works by contemporary composers. Maintaining a chamber music approach even in large-scale vocal-instrumental projects, Antiphonus has presented a number of acclaimed performances, including Bach's St. John Passion and motets, Monteverdi's Vespro della Beata Vergine and almost the complete books of madrigals, Cavalieri's Rappresentatione di Anima et di Corpo, Purcell's Dido and Aeneas, Lasso's Lamentationes and Lagrime di San Pietro, the responsories of Gesualdo and Couperin, Falvetti's Il Diluvio Universale, and Ligeti's Nonsense Madrigals. The ensemble's repertoire also includes numerous contemporary works, Croatian premieres and compositions commissioned especially for Antiphonus. Antiphonus performs regularly at Croatia's leading festivals and concert venues and has appeared internationally, presenting Croatian musical culture in Germany, Finland, Slovenia, Serbia and France. The ensemble has also taken part in a number of major cultural and state events, including the celebrations marking Croatia's accession to the European Union and the cultural programme of the Croatian Presidency of the Council of the European Union in Brussels. Over the years, Antiphonus has collaborated with distinguished Croatian and international artists, including Krešimir Špicer, Dmitry Sinkovsky, Pavao Mašić, Krešimir Stražanac, Edin Karamazov, Petrit Çeku, Daniel Detoni, Filip Fak, Luca Pianca, Monika Leskovar, Vlatka Peljhan, Jan Niković, Karolina Eyck and Margret Koell. Its discography includes the albums Ne le tue braze, devoted to seventeenth-century Croatian music, and Mixtape, featuring works by contemporary Croatian composers. The ensemble received the Milka Trnina Award of the Croatian Society of Music Artists for its concert series Triade, which has, for many years, been distinguished by its imaginative and thoughtfully conceived programming.
The Quinta Essentia ensemble was founded in 2020 with the aim of bringing together outstanding young musicians specialising in historically informed performance. It represents a new generation of artists who, through their knowledge, extensive training and professional experience, seek to further develop and share Europe's rich early music heritage—a tradition that is already present in Croatia but still offers ample scope for further artistic development and recognition. The ensemble made its debut at the Korkyra Baroque Festival on the island of Korčula, and among its most notable appearances is its performance at the Dubrovnik Summer Festival in 2025.
Stjepan Nodilo (born in Dubrovnik in 1986) completed his primary and secondary music education in his hometown before pursuing advanced studies in early music in Austria. In 2005 he began studying recorder at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna under Hans Maria Kneihs, graduating with a master's degree in 2012. At the same time, he studied historical oboes – Baroque, Classical and Romantic – with Carin van Heerden at the Anton Bruckner Private University in Linz and with Andreas Helm at the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz, where he also completed his master's degree. A specialist in historical woodwind instruments, Nodilo performs regularly with numerous European ensembles, including Orfeo Barockorchester (Linz), Capella Leopoldina (Graz), Tiroler Barockinstrumentalisten and Academia Jacobus Stainer (Innsbruck), Ensemble Art House (Graz), La Banda (Augsburg), Orfeo Orchestra (Budapest), Capella Savaria (Szombathely), {Oh} Orchestra (Warsaw) and Cordia Ensemble (Bruneck). During his career, he has collaborated with distinguished conductors and musicians including Ton Koopman, Jordi Savall, Enrico Onofri, Aapo Häkkinen, Stefan Gottfried, Marcus Creed, Martyna Pastuszka, Stefano Veggetti and Rachel Podger.
In 2023, he was invited to lead masterclasses in historical oboe and chamber music at the internationally renowned Academy of Ancient Music Brunico. Since 2016, he has served as principal oboist of the Croatian Baroque Ensemble, with which he appears regularly as an orchestral, chamber and solo musician. He is also the artistic director of the Croatian ensembles Quinta Essentia and Zabapuh (Zagreb Baroque Wind Players), both dedicated to the performance of music on historical instruments.
Krešimir Stražanac is an internationally acclaimed Croatian bass-baritone who performs regularly with many of the world's leading orchestras and conductors. Among his recent highlights are a European tour with the Berlin Philharmonic under Kirill Petrenko, concerts with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra and Klaus Mäkelä, the Los Angeles Philharmonic under Emmanuelle Haïm, and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra conducted by Nathalie Stutzmann. He studied singing with Dunja Vejzović and lied interpretation with Cornelis Witthoefft at the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart, and continued his artistic development with Jane Thorner Mengedoht and Hanns-Friedrich Kunz. Following his graduation, he joined the Zurich Opera as a soloist, where he remained for seven seasons. He has also appeared with the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, Oper Frankfurt, Theater an der Wien in Vienna and the Gran Teatre del Liceu in Barcelona. Stražanac is the winner of the international Cantilena Competition in Bayreuth (opera and operetta), La voce of the Bavarian Broadcasting Corporation (art song), and the Hugo Wolf Competition in Slovenj Gradec. He also received an award at the Paula Solomon-Lindberg Competition in Berlin and, in 2025, was honoured with the Milka Trnina Award. He has collaborated with ensembles and orchestras including the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Concentus Musicus Wien, the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, the Gewandhaus Orchestra Leipzig, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Bamberg Symphony, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra. His musical partners have included Giovanni Antonini, Herbert Blomstedt, Iván Fischer, Bernard Haitink, Philippe Herreweghe, Manfred Honeck, René Jacobs, Václav Luks, Masaaki Suzuki and Franz Welser-Möst. He has appeared in some of the world's most prestigious concert halls, including the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Musikverein and Konzerthaus in Vienna, the Berlin Philharmonie, the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles and Suntory Hall in Tokyo. He also gives regular recitals devoted to art song throughout Europe, Japan and Brazil, and performs at leading international festivals, including the Salzburg Festival, the Menuhin Festival Gstaad, Bachfest Leipzig and the Bach Festival Montréal. In 2022, he served as a jury member of the 11th International Franz Schubert and Modern Music Competition in Graz. His discography comprises more than twenty albums released by leading international record labels. Since 2024, he has been recording a series of song albums for Hänssler Classic, which have received widespread critical acclaim across Europe and the United States. His debut album, featuring the first recordings of songs by Blagoj Bersa in collaboration with pianist Krešimir Starčević, received a Porin Award and was nominated for the International Classical Music Awards in the Vocal Music category. In the 2026/2027 season, he will perform the title role in Antonio Salieri's Falstaff under the baton of René Jacobs.