About
The home of early music in Serbia
The Studio for Early Music was founded in Belgrade in 1992, immediately after the first Belgrade Early Music Festival, as an association of performers and lovers of medieval, Renaissance and baroque music. For thirty-five years, first in Yugoslavia and then in Serbia, it has been at the centre of almost everything that happens in early music here.
The Studio organises the Belgrade Early Music Festival and the Belgrade Baroque Academy, founded Continuo, the first Yugoslav magazine for early music, and is the home of the Ensemble of the Studio for Early Music. It has presented hundreds of concerts, many at St Peter’s Church, brought artists such as Evelyn Tubb, Anthony Rooley, Michael Fields, Genoveva Gálvez and Friedemann Immer to Belgrade, and helped introduce period instruments into the curriculum of Serbian music schools.
Today the Studio connects festival, academy, opera and ensembles, working to make early music and historical performance accessible to audiences, young musicians and schools throughout Serbia.
Programmes
Festival, academy, opera, orchestra
Belgrade Early Music Festival
Serbia’s oldest early music festival, founded in 1991 and revived in 2012: around ten concerts a year at St Peter’s Church, the Cathedral and in Novi Sad. Muzika klasika award for the best classical music festival in Serbia (2017).
Visit website →
Belgrade Baroque Academy
Since 2013 young singers and instrumentalists have worked with leading European artists and staged baroque operas: Rinaldo, Giulio Cesare, Alcina, Siroe and Ariodante.
Visit website →
New Belgrade Opera
An opera company for baroque opera on period instruments (2014): Poppea, Orlando, L’Orfeo, Acis and Galatea and Giulio Cesare in Egitto.
Visit website →
New Trinity Baroque
A London period-instrument orchestra (1998) and for fifteen years the resident ensemble of the Festival and the Academy.
Visit website →History
From 1991 to today
- 1991
The first Belgrade Early Music Festival, initiated by Dragan Karolić, with Predrag Gosta as artistic director.
- 1992
The Studio for Early Music is founded as an association of performers and lovers of medieval, Renaissance and baroque music.
- 1993
Predrag Gosta founds the Ensemble of the Studio for Early Music.
- 1994
Launch of Continuo, the first Yugoslav magazine devoted to early music.
- 1995
The Ensemble appears at Dartington (UK); with the Ministry of Education, early music enters the curriculum of Serbian music schools: recorder, traverso, viola da gamba, harpsichord.
- 1996
Sixth festival; the cassette Il Pastor Fido (Monteverdi, Marini, Bennet, Palestrina). Belgrade’s first period-instrument baroque opera: Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas with Evelyn Tubb and Sprezzatura.
- 2008
The Studio’s Ensemble, directed by Predrag Đoković, performs “Medieval sacred music on the shores of the Channel” at the Ethnographic Museum.
- 2012
Twenty years of the Studio: the Festival is revived with a seventh edition of 14 concerts at St Peter’s Church.
- 2013
The Belgrade Baroque Academy is founded.
- 2014
New Belgrade Opera is founded; L’incoronazione di Poppea receives its Serbian premiere.
- 2017
The Festival is named best classical music festival in Serbia by Muzika klasika.
- 2025
The 20th Belgrade Early Music Festival and 24th Belgrade Baroque Academy.
- 2026
21st Festival; Giulio Cesare in Egitto at the Madlenianum and at the Grimeborn Opera Festival in London.
- 2027
35 years of the Studio for Early Music.
Ensemble
Ensemble of the Studio for Early Music
Predrag Gosta founded the Ensemble of the Studio for Early Music in 1993. It was the first ensemble in the country to perform seventeenth- and eighteenth-century music on period instruments, with a repertoire ranging from Byzantine and old Serbian sacred music through the Middle Ages and Renaissance to the baroque.
The Ensemble performed in Belgrade, Novi Sad, Budva, Sombor and Kanjiža and abroad, worked with Evelyn Tubb, Anthony Rooley and Michael Fields, and its members studied with Emma Kirkby, Colin Tilney, Ivor Bolton and The Dufay Collective. Its artistic direction later passed to Predrag Đoković.
Listen
Medieval sacred music on the shores of the Channel
Ensemble of the Studio for Early Music, directed by Predrag Đoković · Ethnographic Museum, Belgrade, 5 April 2008
- Perotinus Ave virgo virginum, conductus
- Guillaume Dufay Kyrie eleison
- Guillaume Dufay Hostis Herodes impie, hymn
- Anonim, Engleska, XV vek Salve sancta parens, carol
Continuo magazine
The first Yugoslav magazine for early music was launched in 1994 on the initiative of Dragan Karolić (editor-in-chief), with Predrag Gosta as managing editor. Its forty pages covered history and performance, early instruments, composers, courses and concerts, and from the fourth issue (1995) it was also published online.
The scene
Early music in Serbia
Ensembles and organisations devoted to early music in Serbia, whether or not they are members of the Studio. If your ensemble is missing or the details are out of date, please write to us.
Ensemble Renesans
Belgrade
The region’s oldest early music ensemble (1969): medieval, Renaissance and baroque music and Serbian musical heritage, more than 2,000 concerts.
Ensemble of the Studio for Early Music
Belgrade
The Studio’s own vocal and instrumental ensemble, founded 1993.
New Trinity Baroque
London / Belgrade
Period-instrument orchestra (1998), resident ensemble of the Festival.
New Belgrade Opera soloists and vocal consort
Belgrade
Singers of NBO’s baroque opera productions and the Belgrade Baroque Academy.
Musica Antiqua Neoplantensis
Novi Sad
Novi Sad early music ensemble with members from Serbia and Brazil.
Early music vocal ensemble Dom muza
Serbia
Vocal ensemble devoted to medieval and Renaissance music.
Temenos
Belgrade
Early music ensemble, part of the revived Festival in 2012.
VisAntiqua
Belgrade
Early music ensemble, part of the revived Festival in 2012.
Flauto Dolce
Belgrade
Recorder ensemble, Festival participant.
Belgrade Baroque
Belgrade
Baroque ensemble, part of the revived Festival in 2012.
Chamber choir Melódi
Serbia
Chamber choir and Festival guest since the 1990s.
Organisations
- Centre for Early Music Renesans · Belgrade
- Vojvodina Early Music Association (VEMA) · Novi Sad
The region
Early music festivals in the region
Festivals around us that champion early music and historical performance. The Studio is part of this network and works with artists and organisers across the region.
Serbia
- Belgrade Early Music FestivalBelgrade · since 1991
- Days of Baroque MusicNovi Sad
- Rossi FestBelgrade · since 2018
- Medimus, international early music festivalPrizren
Croatia
- Varaždin Baroque EveningsVaraždin · since 1971
Slovenia
- Festival RadovljicaRadovljica · since 1983
- Seviqc BrežiceBrežice · since 1993
Bulgaria
Hungary
Romania
- Early Music Festival Miercurea CiucMiercurea Ciuc · since 1980
Austria
- Innsbrucker Festwochen der Alten MusikInnsbruck · since 1976
- StyriarteGraz · since 1985
Join us
Become a member
The Studio brings together professional musicians, students and lovers of early music. Members hear first about concerts, courses and workshops, can perform at the Festival and take part in the Academy. Write to us if you would like to join, support the Studio’s work or propose a collaboration.