Jacob Breedlove Bio

Jacob Breedlove is a musician, puppeteer, artist and teacher, who is devoted to sharing his love for history and human culture, especially through performance and teaching.

Special areas of focus are: Medieval and Renaissance music, early dance and drama, puppetry, the construction, repair and playing of ancient musical instruments, particularly harpsichord, clavichord, hurdy-gurdy, regal, vielle, viola da gamba, and capped reeds.

He has worked with Curtis Berak (LA), Jack Peters (SEA), Stefan Puchalski (Port Townsend), and Olympic Musical Instruments (Indianola), as apprentice in building, regulating, and repairing musical instruments.

Early on, he collaborated with Joanne Slivinski of Bellingham, Washington, forming successively the Medieval music groups Corrupted Endeavor, and Narrenschyffe.

For many years he has taught and performed with Shulamit Kleinerman and Seattle Historical Arts for Kids (SHAK), as well as performing and recording with numerous other ensembles, including Clay Martin Puppet Theatre (Don Juan, Dr. Faustus), Kim Pineda and the Benevolent Order of Music of the Baroque (BOMB), City Cantabile Choir, Sacred Flight, Strings of Compassion, Ave! Renaissance Women’s Choir, the sisters, Shulamit Kleinerman, Gary Plouff, the Portland Revels.

He has a 25+ year association with Camlann Medieval Village (Carnation, Washington) where he has demonstrated spinning, weaving, dying, performed Medieval music, built masks, stages, sets, backdrops and co-directed plays and many puppet shows including:

The Tale of Woe (1993)
The Cantigas of Santa Maria (1994)
The Old woman and the Devil (1999)
Auricula Meretricula (2001)
Auden and the Bear (2005)
Sir Orfeo (2008)
Sir Gawain and the Stone (2009)
The Book of Job (2010)
Sir Gawain and the Lion (2011)
The Wicked Sacristan (2013 & 2015)
Why the Sea is Salt (2014)

He also co-wrote and directed two Taoist dramas, Nothing and No One (2009), a public spectacle for Black Friday, and Taoist Entertainment (2006), a shadow puppet show based on Tang dynasty poetry, at Wolf Creek, Oregon, as well as making giant parade puppets for the Portland Day of the Dead Parade (2009).

He is currently working on projects with Emily Lau, Curious Voices (Portland), Stardust (San Francisco), and on his own puppet show based on the lives of Machaut and Landini, called The Art of Courtly Love.