Arts and Culture Texas Magazine names Stephanie Raby a "Texas String Diva".
Multi-instrumentalist Stephanie Raby, a native of San Marcos, TX, stays busy shuttling between Austin, Dallas/Ft. Worth, and Houston as a Baroque violinist and early music specialist. Although her undergraduate degree from the University of North Texas is in modern violin performance, she took up the viola da gamba and the baroque violin while participating in the early music ensemble at UNT.
Raby had every intention of continuing to study the modern violin, but when she was accepted into University of Indiana’s renowned early music program, she made a commitment to the Baroque violin. “I decided if I’m going to do an early music degree, I’m going to do it 150%. When you play Baroque violin, the technique is not the same at all—the position, the shifting technique, the way I use my bow, it’s all different. I needed to drop the modern violin for awhile so I could work out my technique on the baroque instrument.”
When she moved back home to Texas, Raby was pleasantly surprised by the amount of work she could find as a Baroque violinist. In Austin alone, she serves as concertmaster of the Austin Baroque Orchestra, plays viola and violin with La Follia Austin Baroque, plays violin and viola da gamba with Texas Early Music Project, and performs in costume on a variety of Medieval and Renaissance string instruments with the Austin Troubadours. In Houston she plays regularly with Ars Lyrica and Houston Bach Society, and in Dallas with Orchestra of New Spain, Dallas Bach Society, and the new-on-the-scene American Baroque Opera Company. “My passion is chamber music,” says Raby. “In early music even the orchestral pieces are chamber music. I learned how to lead an orchestra without a conductor. The ensembles are smaller, so we rely on each other. We communicate.” Another reason she loves early music? “You can hear the same piece six times and it’s literally never the same. Early music encourages improvisation. I love playing with ensembles where I am allowed to be creative.”
Raby has poured her passion for early music into establishing two ensembles with very different aims. Les Touches, which she co-founded with fellow IU graduate Pedro Funes, partners with Viols of Houston to bring the experience of learning and performing early music to high school students. Through the Viola da Gamba Society of America’s (VdGSA) instrument loan program, they were able to build a viol consort at Oak Ridge High School (Conroe, TX). The greatest triumph for Raby was taking all those students to Boston’s prestigious Early Music Festival to perform on the VdGSA’s showcase concert last summer.
Co-founding Lumedia Musicworks is a dream come true for Raby. “Lumedia is the closest thing to what I have really wanted to do for a very long time. Our idea is to do three things each half season, one collaborative event, one music video, and one regular concert in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex.” Envisioning a marriage of 21st century technology to 18th century styles, Raby hopes to put early music in context for people. This spring, look for Lumedia’s collaboration with the North Texas Traditional Dance Society (we’re talking a Contra and English Country Dance party here), as well as its second video release and a captivating new concert (“Seeing Double”) to follow its wildly successful inaugural concert (“Wonder Woman”) last fall.
Original Post: http://artsandculturetx.com/texas-string-divas/