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| | Arts Calendar / October 23 / Concerts |
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19:00 | Gershwin: Porgy and Bess |
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Moscow State Academic Chamber Choir (music director and chief conductor - Vladimir Minin), Svetlanov Symphony Orchestra of Russia and soloists conducted by Wayne Marshall (UK), who has swiftly established an international career as an organist and pianist and later as a conductor, will perform a concert version of "Porgy and Bess" by Gershwin. Soloists: soprano Indira Mahajan (USA), Marian Anderson Award-winning praised for her strongly centered, richly textured, and poignant soprano; Angela Renee Simpson (USA), a dramatic soprano whose voice have proclaimed wonderfully powerful, fascinating, thrilling and extraordinary by critics the world over; Ronald Samm (UK), who is widely recognised as one of the most versatile dramatic lyric tenors of his generation and has been highly acclaimed for his interpretations of a wide variety of operatic roles and concert repertoire; Kevin Short (USA), the versatile bass-baritone, an associate professor in vocal performance at the University of Miami Frost School of Music, who has also thrilled audiences around the globe in a wide range of repertoire ranging from Mozart's Die Entfuhrung aus dem Serail to Verdi's Attila and Don Carlos, and Bizet's Carmen. The opera Porgy and Bess was first performed in 1935, with music by George Gershwin, libretto by DuBose Heyward, and lyrics by DuBose Heyward and Ira Gershwin. It was based on DuBose Heyward's novel Porgy and subsequent play of the same title, which he co-wrote with his wife Dorothy Heyward. All three works deal with African-American life in the fictitious Catfish Row (based on the area of Cabbage Row) in Charleston, South Carolina, in the early 1920s. Originally conceived by George Gershwin as an "American folk opera", Porgy and Bess premiered in New York in the fall of 1935 and featured an entire cast of classically trained African-American singers - a daring artistic choice at the time. The song "Summertime" is the best-known selection from Porgy and Bess. Other popular and frequently recorded songs from the opera include "It Ain't Necessarily So", "Bess, You Is My Woman Now", "I Loves You, Porgy" and "I Got Plenty o' Nuttin'". The opera is admired for Gershwin's innovative synthesis of European orchestral techniques with American jazz and folk music idioms. Porgy and Bess tells the story of Porgy, a disabled black beggar living in the slums of Charleston, South Carolina. It deals with his attempts to rescue Bess from the clutches of Crown, her violent and possessive lover, and Sportin' Life, the drug dealer. Where the earlier novel and stage-play differ, the opera generally follows the stage-play.
Tchaikovsky Concert Hall  |
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