Orquestra Barroca Casa da Música was formed in 2006 to perform Baroque music from a historically-informed perspective.

Orquestra Barroca Casa da Música was formed in 2006 to perform Baroque music from a historically-informed perspective. Besides regular work with its principal conductor, Laurence Cummings, the orchestra has performed under the direction of Rinaldo Alessandrini, Alfredo Bernardini, Amandine Beyer, Fabio Biondi, Harry Christophers, Antonio Florio, Paul Hillier, Paul McCreesh, Riccardo Minasi, Hervé Niquet, Andrew Parrott, Rachel Podger, Christophe Rousset, Dmitri Sinkovsky, Andreas Staier and Masaaki Suzuki, accompanying soloists such as Andreas Staier, Roberta Invernizzi, Franco Fagioli, Peter Kooij, Dmitri Sinkovsky, Alina Ibragimova, Rachel Podger, Marie Lys, Iestyn Davies, Rowan Pierce, and in the company of vocal groups like The Sixteen, Coro Casa da Música and Coro Infantil Casa da Música.

The OBCM concerts have attracted unanimous critical acclaim from critics in Portugal and abroad. It presented the Portuguese premiere of Handel’s opera Ottone and the modern premiere of L’Ippolito by Francisco António de Almeida, in 2012. The orchestra has performed in several Portuguese cities and in Spain (Úbeda y Baeza Early Music Festival), England (Handel Festival in London), France (Dijon Opera and Baroque Festivals in Sablé and Ambronay), Germany (BASF in Ludwigshafen am Rhein), Austria (Konzerthaus Vienna) and China (Beijing Conservatory). It joined Coro Casa da Música to perform Bach’s Christmas Cantatas and Mass in B minor, Charpentier’s Te Deum and Missa Assumpta est Maria, excerpts from Handel’s Messiah and Domenico Zipoli’s Vespers of Saint Ignatius. 2015 saw its highly acclaimed debut at Palau de la Música Catalana in Barcelona. Highlights of that same year include the complete Brandenburg Concertos under Laurence Cummings.

OBCM has worked regularly with the internationally renowned harpsichordist, Andreas Staier, with whom it recorded the album À Portuguesa (Harmonia Mundi, 2018) including works by the important baroque Portuguese composer, Carlos Seixas. In 2018, they performed these works not only in Porto, but also at Dijon Opera, BASF in Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Vienna Konzerthaus and Sintra. In 2019, the orchestra performed Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater, Bach’s The Art of the Fugue and Monteverdi’s Vespers.

The 2021 season marks Orquestra Barroca’s 15th anniversary. It includes Bach’s Easter Oratorio, Ascension Oratorio and Christmas Oratorio, and collaborations with notable international artists as countertenor Andreas Scholl (a Bach’s cantata and Vivaldi’s Stabat Mater) and cellist Pieter Wispelwey (Haydn’s Concerto).

OBCM released live CDs including works by Avison, D. Scarlatti, Carlos Seixas, Avondano, Vivaldi, Bach, Muffat, Handel and Haydn, under the direction of some of the most prestigious international conductors.

Laurence Cummings is one of Britain's most exciting and versatile exponents of historical performance both as a conductor and a harpsichord player. He is currently Music Director of the Academy of Ancient Music, Musical Director of the London Handel Festival and Music Director of Orquestra Barroca Casa da Música in Porto. A noted authority on Handel, the Guardian has written of him “he now ranks as one of the composer’s best advocates in the world.”

Frequently praised for his stylish and compelling performances in the opera house, his career has taken him across Europe where he has conducted productions at houses including Opernhaus Zurich (Belshazzar, King Arthur), Theater an der Wien (Saul), Gothenburg Opera (Orfeo ed Euridice, Giulio Cesare, Alcina and Idomeneo). Théâtre du Châtelet (Saul) and Opera de Lyon (Messiah). In the UK he has been a regular at English National Opera (Radamisto, L’Incoronazione di Poppea, Semele, Messiah, Orfeo and The Indian Queen), Glyndebourne Festival Opera (Saul, Giulio Cesare and The Fairy Queen) and Garsington Opera (Vivaldi cycle: L’Incoronazione di Dario, L’Olympiade and La Verita in Cimento), as well as conducting at the Royal Opera House’s Linbury Theatre (Berenice and Alceste), Opera North (L’Incoronazione di Poppea), Buxton International Festival (Tamerlano and Mozart’s Lucio Silla) and for Opera GlassWorks (The Rake’s Progress). The 2020/21 season saw his last festival of the Internationale Händel-Festpiele Göttingen, where he was Artistic Director for nine years.

Equally at home on the concert platform, he is regularly invited to conduct both period and modern instrument orchestras worldwide, including Academy of Ancient Music, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, The English Concert, Handel and Haydn Society Boston, Croatian Baroque Orchestra, La Scintilla Zurich, Juilliard 415, Zurich Chamber Orchestra, Musikcollegium Winterthur, St Paul Chamber Orchestra, Basel Chamber Orchestra, Moscow Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Washington National Symphony Orchestra, Kansas City Symphony, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, Jerusalem Symphony and in the UK with Royal Northern Sinfonia, Hallé Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Ulster Orchestra and Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

His recordings include discs with Emma Kirkby and Royal Academy of Music on BIS, Angelika Kirschlager and the Basel Chamber Orchestra for Sony BMG, Maurice Steger and The English Concert for Harmonia Mundi and Ruby Hughes and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment on Chandos, as well as a series of live opera and concert performances recorded at the Göttingen International Handel Festival and released on Accent. He has also released numerous solo harpsichord recital and chamber music recordings for Naxos.

He was an organ scholar at Christ Church Oxford where he graduated with first class honours. Until 2012 he was Head of Historical Performance at the Royal Academy of Music which led to both baroque and classical orchestras forming part of the established curriculum. He is now the William Crotch Professor of Historical Performance.