About The Early Interval
About The Performers
Since 1976, The Early Interval has explored and celebrated the rich history of medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque music, inviting their audiences to experience a millennium of exciting sound worlds. The ensemble sings and performs on replica instruments unique to each period, including recorders, viols, violin, lutes, percussion, and many more. The group often collaborates with actors, dancers, vocal ensembles, narrators, composers, and guest musicians to create and present engaging thematic programs that transport the listener to an earlier time and place.
Many talented and dedicated musicians have been members of The Early Interval during its history. Below are the current core members, with numerous vocal and instrumental guest artists participating frequently in the ensemble's programs.
James Bates
Jim Bates began performing with The Early Interval in 2002. Before moving to Columbus, he was on the faculty of the University of Louisville School of Music, he was Music Director of the Louisville Youth Orchestra, and he directed the Louisville Mandolin Orchestra. Dr. Bates is currently Director of Orchestral Activities at Otterbein University, Principal Bass and Assistant Conductor of the Westerville Symphony and Assistant Conductor of the Columbus Symphony Youth Orchestra Cadet Orchestra. Dr. Bates joined the conducting staff of the Interlochen Center for the Arts in 1999 and has served as guest conductor or clinician throughout the United States. Dr. Bates serves on the national board of The Classical Mandolin Society of America. He is also honored to serve on the board of the Friends of Early Music in Columbus. While pursuing a Masters degree in double bass at Indiana University, he was active in the Early Music Institute and studied with Stanley Ritchie, Thomas Binkley and Wendy Gillespie. He also participated in the Early Music Ensemble at the University of Louisville, working closely with its director, Jack Ashworth. He received his Ph.D. in Musicology from the University of Kentucky in 2002. Jim plays viola da gamba and other bowed strings as well as various wind instruments.
Sean Ferguson
Sean Ferguson began performing with The Early Interval in 2009. He holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music history from The Ohio State University and a master of library science degree from Kent State University. In Philadelphia, he studied guitar at the University of the Arts and was a winner of the WFLN Radio Instrumentalists Competition. As a soloist, accompanist, chamber musician and orchestra member, he has performed extensively on instruments of the lute family and classical and early guitars, including appearances with Opera Columbus, Columbus Dance Theatre, Lancaster Chorale, The Ohio State University, Otterbein University, Capital University and Ohio Wesleyan University. He has collaborated as a continuo player for numerous concerts and productions of Baroque operas by Monteverdi, Cavalli, Purcell, and Handel, working under lutenist-conductors Lyle Nordstrom and Lucas Harris, among others. As a librarian, he has worked at OCLC Online Computer Library Center and The Ohio State University Music & Dance Library. He is president of the Columbus Guitar Society. Sean is The Early Interval’s plucked strings specialist.
Guillermo Salas-Suárez
Costa Rican Baroque violinist and Columbus resident Guillermo Salas-Suárez holds a Doctorate of Musical Arts in Historical Performance from Case Western Reserve University, where he studied with Dr. Julie Andrijeski. In demand as a period player, he performs with several ensembles, including the Lyra and Atlanta Baroque Orchestras, Apollo’s Fire, The Newberry Consort, Lumedia MusicWorks, Bach Collegium Fort Wayne, and conducts workshops and lectures across the Americas.
Guillermo’s chamber music appetite spans from the Renaissance and early Baroque, which he explores with The Early Interval, up to the Classical and early Romantic repertoire for string quartet and clarinet with Wit’s Folly, which he co-founded. He has collaborated and trained with Malcolm Bilson, Paolo Pandolfo, Jaap ten Linden, Barthold Kuijken, Bruce Dickey, and the late Jeanne Lamon at the early music festivals in Boston, Bloomington, Amherst, Bach Oregon, Urbino (Italy), Daroca (Spain), Saintes (France), and the Stuttgart Bachwoche (Germany). As a scholar of Spanish and colonial music, he has presented his research in conferences at Boston, Indiana, and Oregon Universities, and Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México. His upcoming book for Indiana University Press translates and discusses Spanish violin treatises from the 18th century. As an educator, Guillermo is committed to the advancement of historical performance practice in Latin America. He is on the faculty at the Festival de Musica de Santa Catarina (Brazil), and has given masterclasses at the Academia de Música Antigua de Medellín (Colombia), and Instituto Nacional de Música (Costa Rica).
Guillermo started music lessons at age nine in his native Costa Rica, where he studied with Lidia Blanco, Mercedes Moreno and José Aurelio Castillo. Before switching to Baroque, he studied in the US and Bulgaria with Dr. Borislava Iltcheva, Aleksandr Iltchev, Espen Lilleslåtten, and Dr. Lin He. He shared the stage with conductors and soloists Manfred Honeck, Robert Spano, Yefim Bronfman, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Midori, Lang Lang, and Renée Fleming at the Aspen Music Festival, Severance Hall, Sala São Paulo (Brazil), and the National Theatres of Costa Rica, Panama, Nicaragua, and Honduras. He performed with the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra, CityMusic Cleveland, Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional and Orquesta Sinfónica de Heredia (Costa Rica). He currently serves in Early Music America’s IDEA Task Force, dedicated to promoting diversity and inclusion in early music throughout the Americas. Upcoming engagements include appearances with SoundSalon, North Carolina Baroque Orchestra, and The American Baroque Opera Company. He plays on an instrument by Jason Viseltear and bows by Michelle Speller, H.F. Grabenstein, Pieter Affourtit, and James Dodd II. Outside of music, Guillermo enjoys literature, learning languages, and practicing yoga.
David Stefano
A Columbus native, David Stefano is currently on the faculty of Otterbein University, co-
directing the Otterbein Early Music Ensemble. He holds degrees in bassoon performance from
Indiana University, under the tutelage of Kim Walker, and earned his Ph.D in Early Music from
the Sydney Conservatorium of Music (Australia). David previously taught at Bridgewater State
University in Massachusetts and coached ensembles at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology. David has performed locally as a recorder soloist, and as a bassoonist with Ohio
Capital Winds, the Newark-Granville Symphony Orchestra, and the Westerville Symphony. He
has also performed internationally with ensembles such as Latitude 37 and the Australian
Brandenburg Orchestra, among others.
Elizabeth McConnaughey
Elizabeth McConnaughey hails from Columbus, Ohio and has a passion for Baroque and early music literature, having performed the roles of Belinda in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Second Midwife in Play of Herod, the title role of Thisbe in Lampe's Pyramus and Thisbe, and covering the role of Damon Handel’s Acis and Galatea. Additionally, she has maintained a strong interest in new music and had the pleasure of premiering three characters from Chappell Kingsland’s commissioned opera for young audiences, The Firebringers, while completing her Master’s degree at Indiana University. Ms. McConnaughey maintains an active performance schedule in central Ohio working with Opera Project Columbus, The Early Interval, Lancaster Chorale, and First Congregational Church.
Emily Noël
Soprano Emily Noël concertizes throughout North America and Europe in a wide variety of repertory expanding from the medieval to the contemporary. Highlights of recent seasons include Davenant’s Macbeth at the Folger Shakespeare Theatre, The Merchant of Venice with the Gabrieli Consort at the Wanamaker Theatre at Shakespeare's Globe in London, and Measure + Dido with the Folger Consort at the John F. Kennedy Center in Washington DC, where she played Mariana opposite Derek Jacobi's Angelo. Other stage credits include Gilda in Verdi's Rigoletto with Ente Concerti Città di Iglesias, and Nora in Vaughn Williams' Riders to the Sea at the Amsterdam Grachtenfestival. Past performances include engagements with The Folger Concert, Mountainside Baroque, and an outreach for the Santa Fe Opera Guild with early music ensemble Severall Friends. Ms. Noël serves on the faculty of Denison University, where she teaches applied voice.