Emmanuelle Haïm, a world class Baroque figure and director of Le Concert d’Astrée, has been dubbed ‘Ms. Dynamite of French Baroque’ by the British press. She is the first  female conductor in residence to perform for the next two seasons with the CMVC. She will be directing a programme devoted to Michel-Richard de Lalande, superintendent of the Musique du Roi and certainly the most prolific composer of grands motets at the court in Versailles. Emmanuelle Haïm will be presenting two little-known early works by Lalande - Deitatis majestatem and Audite coeli quae loquor (the latter referring to the Last Judgment, a biblical episode rarely set to music in the Baroque era). A gifted teacher and inspired transmitter of her love of music, Emmanuelle Haïm will also be running a masterclass and workshop devoted to the rich, emblematic 17^th and 18^th genre - the French cantata.