Performance Year: 2026
Ruckus is a shapeshifting, collaborative baroque band with a visceral and playful approach to early music. The ensemble debuted in Handel’s Aci, Galatea e Polifemo in a production directed by Christopher Alden featuring Anthony Roth Costanzo, Ambur Braid, and Davóne Tines at National Sawdust. The band’s playing earned widespread critical acclaim: “achingly delicate one moment, incisive and punchy the next” (New York Times); “superb” (Opera News).
Ruckus’s core is a continuo group, the baroque equivalent of a jazz rhythm section: guitars, keyboards, cello, bassoon and bass. Other members include soloists of the violin, flute, and oboe. The ensemble aims to fuse the early-music movement’s questing, creative spirit with the grit, groove, and jangle of American roots music, creating a unique sound of “rough-edged intensity” (New Yorker). Its members are assembled from among the most creative and virtuosic performers in North American early music and is based in New York City.
Ruckus is the “house band” for Hudson Hall’s baroque opera productions, directed by R.B. Schlather. The New York Times reviewed the 2023 production of Handel’s Rodelinda, praising Ruckus’ unconducted playing as “mercurial, almost improvisatory in spirit that responded to the drama in real time.” The ensemble made its Ojai Festival debut in 2022, performing a wide range of music from Bach to the improvisational scores of Roscoe Mitchell and George Lewis to a recital featuring Anthony Roth Costanzo and an original opera by bassist member Doug Balliett.
Recent highlights include the world premiere of The Metropolis Trilogy by pioneering artist and NEA Jazz Master Roscoe Mitchell alongside Emi Ferguson and the Immanuel Wilkins Quartet. In 2025, Ruckus and violinist Keir GoGwilt premiered The Edinburgh Rollick, bringing to life tunes from the Gow Collections of Strathspey Reels, Books 1 and 2 (1784 and 1788), and Ruckus returned to Hudson Hall in April of 2025 for Handel’s blockbuster opera Giulio Cesare.
