Mission

We believe in the power and beauty of vocal music to stir the emotions, challenge the mind, and lift the spirit. Through virtuosic artistry, scholarly research, and a collaborative work style, we produce imaginative and inspiring performances and educational programs that reawaken the ancient, connecting each individual to compelling stories of human culture and spirituality from around the world.

Vision

By 2012, The Rose Ensemble will be among the world’s most respected early vocal music ensembles, distinctive in its purpose and profile, and a shining example of artistic organizational success in North America.

History

Founded in 1996 and based in Saint Paul, Minnesota, The Rose Ensemble reawakens the ancient with vocal music that strives to stir the emotions, challenge the mind, and lift the spirit. Each performance illuminates centuries of rarely heard repertoire, bringing to modern audiences research from the world’s manuscript libraries and fresh perspectives on history, languages, politics, religion and world cultures and traditions. With nine critically acclaimed recordings and a diverse selection of concert programs, the group has thrilled audiences across the United States and Europe with repertoire spanning 1,000 years and over 25 languages, including new research in Hawaiian, Swedish, Middle Eastern and American vocal traditions.

The recipient of the 2005 Chorus America Margaret Hillis Award for Choral Excellence and a first-place winner in the sacred music category at the 2007 Tolosa International Choral Competition (Spain), the group’s concerts and recordings have been called “first class” (Neuss-Grevenbroicher Zeitung), “impassioned and brightly alive” (Choral Journal) and “engaging . .. satisfying” (Gramophone). Founder Jordan Sramek received the 2010 Louis Botto Award from Chorus America “for entrepreneurial zeal.”

The Rose Ensemble can be heard regularly on American Public Media and the European Broadcasting Union (most notably with annual Christmas broadcasts) and was recently featured in special live broadcasts on Radio France, Chicago Public Radio, Vermont Public Radio and National Public Radio’s Performance Today.

The Rose Ensemble’s 16th anniversary season highlights include appearances at Cornell Concert Series (Ithaca, NY), University of Vermont Lane Series, The National Gallery (Washington, D.C.), Secrest Artist Series (Winston-Salem, NC), J. Paul Getty Museum (Los Angeles, CA), and a collaboration with Piffaro, The Renaissance Band (Philadelphia, PA and MN).

The Rose Ensemble’s latest recording, Il Poverello, is a diverse collection of medieval and Renaissance music for Saint Francis of Assisi.

The Origin of The Rose Ensemble’s Name

When I started the group that would become The Rose Ensemble, while I was searching for a name, I decided that I wanted to find some sort of elemental or organic image or symbol that somehow played an important role or bore substantial significance in the worlds of the sacred and secular but also from ages past and our contemporary world. It was a tall order for certain. I started looking through medieval gardening books and first was taken by various herbs and plants, but later on by flowers. I passed by the rose many times until it finally occurred to me that the rose was indeed exactly what I was looking for. The rose (Latin, rosa, in Greek, rhodon) is a symbol that has a rich and ancient history from a number of perspectives:

• It is an important and often sacred symbol in many faiths, especially Christianity, Judaism and Islam.
• The mystical rose (rosa mystica) has often been described as a portal to celestial worlds.
• The rose played a major role in the earthly realm during the medieval, Renaissance and Baroque periods: from courtly love poems of the Troubadours to the Tudor family to Baroque allegorical symbolism of human love, beauty and sweetness.

The rose can also have paradoxical meanings. It is at once a symbol of purity and a symbol of passion; heavenly perfection and earthly passion; virginity and fertility; death and life. The rose is the flower of the goddess Venus but also the blood of Adonis and of Christ. It is a symbol of transmutation – that of taking food from the earth and producing a beautiful fragrant rose. Lastly, throughout history, the rose’s thorns have represented human suffering and the Fall from Paradise, but for centuries the rose garden has been a symbol of resurrection, paradise and the place of the mystic marriage.

Given The Rose Ensemble’s commitment to preserving and performing sacred and secular early music, and especially our programmatic emphasis on exploring spirituality and the human experience through enlightening thought-provoking music and texts, I believe that the rose is a wonderful and very fitting symbol!

Our visual brand features what we internally refer to as ‘the bug,’ although most people call it the ‘Rose logo.’ It was intentionally designed to evoke different images and symbolism for different people. Some people see it as a cross, others view it as a wax seal, some think of it as a celestial portal, and still others call it a shield or our very own coat of arms!”

- Jordan Sramek, Founder/Artistic Director