L. Mark Slawson (harpsichord) received a BA degree in composition
from Union College and a masters degree in harpsichord from New England
Conservatory. He has performed with Cantorum Baroque Ensemble, Boston
Renaissance Ensemble, La Sonnerie de St. Botolphe, among other baroque
groups. He is currently organist and music director at Second Parish, Hingham.
Mark is on the board of the Cambridge Society for Early Music and the Society
for Historically Informed Performance (SoHIP).

Laurie Israel (violoncello) specializes in baroque cello performance practice.
She received a B.A. degree in music from Barnard College, and a masters degree
in musicology/theory from University of California and studied baroque performance practice
at the Longy School of Music. Laurie has performed in the SoHIP concert series with
Complesso Soave and The Splendid Century, and also has performed a solo unaccompanied
cello series entitled “Bach, Bach & Beyond”. She founded Ensemble Suave in 2003.
Ensemble Suave has appeared in a number of music series and reguarly performs at the
Loring-Greenough House and at Cambridge Friends Meetinghouse. She is also a visual artist,
appearing in a number of shows in Massachusetts and New England.

Gerrod Pagenkopf has been touted by the Houston Chronicle as having “an elegant bearing and a sweet, even sound.” Mr. Pagenkopf made his Amarillo Opera debut in October 2008 as Prince Orlofsky in Die Fledermaus. Other opera credits include Rinaldo (Rinaldo), Oberon (A Midsummer Night’s Dream), the Refugee (Flight), Tolomeo (Giulio Cesare), Satirino (La Calisto), Arsamenes (Serse), Public Opinion (Orpheus in the Underworld), the Sorceress, 2nd Witch, and Messenger (Dido and Aeneas), and Actéon (Actéon).

As a concert soloist, Mr. Pagenkopf is a core artist with Ars Lyrica Houston, and has performed
with ensembles including the Mercury Baroque Ensemble, the Bach Society of Houston, the
Houston Chamber Choir, the Dominic Walsh Dance Theater, Several Core Performance Dance
Company, Ballet Florida, Orchestra X (Houston), and the Green Bay Symphony. Mr. Pagenkopf
has performed as soloist in such masterworks as Handel’s Messiah and Israel in Egypt; Bach’s
Passions, Magnificat and Mass in B Minor; Vivaldi’s Gloria and Dixit Dominus; as well as numerous
cantatas, oratorios, and other liturgical works of Scarlatti, Caldara, and Telemann.

In the near future, Mr. Pagenkopf will perform with the Festival de Musica Barroca
de San Miguel de Allende in Mexico and in Vermont as Orlando with the Green Mountain
Opera Festival.

A native of rural Wisconsin, Mr. Pagenkopf received his Bachelors degree in
Music Education from the University of Wisconsin at Madison, and his Masters of
Music in Voice Performance from the University of Houston, where he was a
graduate fellow with Professor Katherine Ciesinski. Mr. Pagenkopf currently resides
in Boston.

To learn more about Gerrod Pagenkopf, visit his website.

© 2012 Ensemble Suave. All Rights Reserved.