Westport Center for the Arts continues its Brown Bag concert series with a performance by the Sweete Accordes featuring Anne Biswell, soprano, and George Moss, Renaissance lutes. The noontime concerts are free (donations accepted) and held in the sanctuary at Westport Presbyterian Church, 201 Westport Road, Kansas City, MO 64111.

According to the performers, the lute was once a very popular instrument, known in fact as the “prince of instruments.” The concert offers a smorgasbord of late Renaissance tunes for lute and voice from across space and time.  It will offer the audience a sample of a century’s musical flavors from across Europe, and explore the Renaissance practice of setting another’s lyrics to one’s own music.

About the performers

Anne Hardy Biswell, soprano, has sung as a soloist and in vocal groups and choral ensembles large and small over the years and has enjoyed traveling the world sharing musical experiences with various cultures.  Biswell majored in voice at the University of South Alabama and studied privately for several years with the late Madame Thilde Beuing in Kansas City. Biswell was fortunate to sing as a member of the chorus as well as soloist on five different choral tours of Europe east and west, including one in 2007 in Germany with the former group, Kansas City Singers, and the Symphonique orchrestra of Angers, France, performing in three different cathedrals, including the Mont Saint-Michel Abbey. She particularly enjoys small ensemble work, as well as recording vocal music.  Recordings include “Lullaby” and “Haus Musik” which she recorded with George Moss. She has sung with several small groups including a trio, Minarets, with whom she recorded a CD, City of Love.  Biswell is retired after 20 years in administrative work in the non-profit sector, and is enjoying being able to spend more time singing, as a member of the Kansas City Symphony Chorus, and Music for a Time, a quartet with piano, violin, cello and voice, as well as her husband of 50 years, children, and four grandchildren.

George Moss has played the Renaissance lute since 1978, playing with ensembles from around the United States. With degrees in Biology/Zoology, Chemical Engineering, and Computer Programming, he worked in tech fields for more than40 years before retiring in 2020. Since then he has devoted himself to his true love of performing and sharing music. For years he’s been particularly drawn to the intimacy of expression in what he calls the music of two: lute songs, duets, etc. He also has a deep interest in introducing new listeners to the charm of this period’s music.

There will be a reception with cookies and coffee after the concert.