Baritone Gerald FinleyThis week’s top picks on the agenda are centered on music old and new, and as usual in Washington there are some excellent free concerts to be heard.
TOP PICKS:
>> Three members of the French early music ensemble Les Folies Françoises — violinist Patrick Cohën-Akenine, harpsichordist Béatrice Martin, and cellist François Poly — will give a concert of music by 18th-century composers Leclair, Royer, and Barrière on Tuesday (March 16, 7:30 p.m.) at La Maison Française.
>> Canadian baritone Gerald Finley will give a recital with pianist Julius Drake, for the Vocal Arts Society, on Wednesday (March 17, 7:30 p.m.) at the Austrian Embassy. The program includes songs by Schumann, Ravel, Barber, and Ives.
>> A group of young Finnish musicians will present a concert of pieces by their countryman, composer Olli Kortekangas (b. 1955), at the Phillips Collection on Thursday (March 18, 6 p.m.).
>> The Atlas Performing Arts Center on H St. NE has added a series of high-definition screenings of opera (and ballet) on film to its schedule, in cooperation with Emerging Pictures. The schedule includes this week’s screening of Bizet’s Carmen (March 17, 7 p.m.; March 20, 2 p.m.), in the 2009 production from La Scala in Milan, with Daniel Barenboim conducting and tenor Jonas Kaufmann as Don José and baritone Erwin Schrott as Escamillo.
>> The new program by the Folger Consort, Ballets and Brawls: French Music of Court and Countryside, runs this weekend, opening on Friday (March 19 to 21) at the Folger Shakespeare Library and featuring French music of the 17th century.
