Philadelphia, PA – Piffaro, the Renaissance Band’s spring season invites audiences on a musical journey to Ferrara and Mexico by way of Philadelphia, Wilmington, and New York City. Concerts will be professionally filmed for online streaming, ensuring access for audiences worldwide. For tickets, program details, and streaming information, visit www.piffaro.org/tix.

March’s program, Ferrara: Splendor of the Renaissance, is inspired by a city steeped in history and beauty. When UNESCO designated Ferrara a World Heritage Site, it dubbed it “The City of the Renaissance,” describing it as a place where the humanist concept of the ‘ideal city’ came to life.

Icons of art, fashion, letters and ideas were drawn to the salons of the ruling d’Este family, whose members nurtured music with particular devotion. For generations, Ferrara sustained a vibrant musical culture that flourished not only in church, but also in courts, salons and civic spaces, enlivening social life and projecting cultural power. When the last d’Este duke died without an heir in 1600, the house went to the Papal State, marking the end of the Renaissance, musically speaking.

Piffaro presents a panoramic concert tracing Ferrara’s extraordinary musical culture from the 15th century through the end of the d’Este dynasty—a period in which Ferrara helped shape the sound of secular music across Europe. Central to this story is the wind band, whose presence remained constant even as musical styles evolved.

The music is splendorous, reflecting the prestige of its patrons. At the heart of the program is the Casanatense Chansonnier, a manuscript almost certainly intended a la pifarescha – for wind band performance. Selections from this source include music by composers associated with the d’Este court, like Josquin des Prez and Johannes Martini, which will be interwoven with dance pieces by dancing masters Domenico da Piacenza and Guglielmo Ebreo. Works by Joan Ambrosio Dalza, including the Pavana alla Ferrarese and Piva alla Ferrarese, also highlight the importance of dance in Renaissance life.

The program does not neglect the great composers Cipriano de Rore and Carlo Gesualdo, who wrote music weighted with an emotional realism that opened the door to a new era. It also offers a rare glimpse into the musical creativity of women in the Italian Renaissance with groundbreaking works by Luzzasco Luzzaschi, who wrote for the professional female singers of the concerto delle donne, and Leonora d’Este, daughter of Lucrezia Borgia and Alfonso I.

A key theme of the concert is the unwritten tradition of Renaissance music-making. Performers learned by listening, adapting, and improvising. Piffaro will bring this practice to life, drawing on knowledge about performance practice gleaned from other sources to recreate dance music preserved in only a single line.

Ferrara: Splendor of the Renaissance is a historical journey, exploring how music, power, and creativity intertwined in one of the Renaissance’s most culturally influential courts.

The season concludes in May with Eagle & Empire: Music of Colonial Mexico, exploring the cultural friction and fusion of European and indigenous musical traditions in colonial-era Mexico.

Piffaro will be joined by an esteemed roster of vocalists: sopranos Nell Snaidas and Estelí Gomez, mezzo-soprano Cecilia Duarte, tenor Jonatan Alvarado, and bass-baritone Andrew Padgett. For this ambitious project, funded by a grant from the Paul M. Angell Family Foundation, Piffaro partners with Esperanza Arts Center and Ollin Yoliztli Calmecac (OYC), Philadelphia’s first Aztec dance troupe and a leading advocate for preserving Mexicayotl traditions. The Friday performance at Teatro Esperanza will feature Aztec dance and traditional foods prepared by OYC.

Piffaro’s beloved Recorder Fest returns on March 7. This free, family-friendly celebration of one of the world’s most accessible and joyful instruments invites the community to participate in a Play-In and enjoy performances by recorder players ranging from age 8 to 80 – students, amateurs, and professionals alike.