Istante Collective is a versatile ensemble committed to reaching out to new audiences through innovative programming in an informal concert environment. Its members include many principal players from the most prestigious historical performance ensembles in the UK and abroad. By combining their diverse experience, they are able to offer a unique musical approach and breadth of repertoire.

Istante is the ensemble in residence for the Baroquestock Festival at Heath Street Baptist Church in Hampstead. Over the last 10 years Baroquestock has built a loyal and diverse audience, offering a unique fusion of historical performance, folk music, community projects and home-cooked food. In addition to the annual festival in late spring, Istante offers a regular ‘Little things in Odd Shapes’ concert series featuring rarely-heard chamber music in unusual combinations. The autumn series includes ‘Italian Sounds in London’, supported by the Italian Cultural Institute, as well as regular cantata performances. Major operatic highlights at Baroquestock include staged productions of Haydn’s ‘Lo Speziale’, Handel’s ‘Rinaldo’ and ‘Apollo and Daphne’, Pergolesi’s ‘Livietta e Tracollo’, J. Blow’s ‘The Birth of Venus’ and Lully’s ‘La naissance de Venus’.

Istante was selected for the 2017-2018 BREMF Live! Scheme and has also performed in a range of venues in the UK and abroad, including the Newbury Festival, Stoke Newington Early Music Festival and the William Walton Foundation in Ischia (Italy). The ensemble also counts a number of collaborations with Opera Vera, performing original arrangements of ‘La Boheme’, ‘Gianni Schicchi’, and Mozart’s da Ponte trilogy.
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Istante’s debut album, ‘Little things in Odd Shapes’, featuring chamber music for mixed string/wind ensemble by L. Boccherini and M. Haydn, was released by Novantiqua Records in 2018. The ensemble is currently working on a multi-disc recording project revolving around the late 18th-Century oboist and composer L.A.Lebrun.