SUNDAY, DEC 18, 2011 at 4:00pm
Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church
Orchestra – $50* / $35 / $25
Obstructed View – $15
Balcony – $20
Student – $12.50 (orch.) / $10 (balc.)
* Premium seating – pre-sale only (not available at the door); premium seating can be purchased for $35 by donors at the benefactor level ($500+)
Escape the holiday rush for a few hours of glorious music!
Don’t miss our inaugural holiday concert in the beautiful acoustic of Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church. The concert will feature the world premiere of Lori Laitman’s new choral cycle, “The Earth and I” — settings of three Emily Dickinson poems. The program will also include winter songs, rare and beautiful carol arrangements, and traditional holiday favorites.
Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church interior view
About the Composer
Lori Laitman is one of America’s most prolific and widely performed composers of vocal music. She has composed two operas, an oratorio, choral works and over 200 songs, setting the words of classical and contemporary poets, among them the lost voices of poets who perished in the Holocaust. “It is difficult to think of anyone before the public today who equals her exceptional gifts for embracing a poetic text and giving it new and deeper life through music.” (Journal of Singing)
Composer, Lori Laitman (photo by Christian Steiner)
The Scarlet Letter, Laitman’s full-length opera, will receive its professional world premiere at Opera Colorado in May 2013. This new production, celebrating the company’s 30th anniversary, will be directed by Beth Greenberg and will feature soprano Elizabeth Futral and tenor James Valenti. The libretto, based on the Hawthorne classic, is by American poet David Mason, the current Poet Laureate of Colorado. Laitman’s oratorio Vedem, another collaboration with Mason, was commissioned by Music of Remembrance, and saw its world premiere in Seattle, WA in May 2010. Naxos released the CD a year later. Laitman and Mason are currently developing a new opera, Ludlow, based on Mason’s award-winning verse novel about the 1914 Colorado mining town disaster.
Laitman’s music continues to gain recognition worldwide. Recently she was a Featured Composer on Thomas Hampson’s Song of America online resource. Upcoming events include the July 2012 premiere of her Todesfuge at Wigmore Hall in London with baritone Wolfgang Holzmair and cellist Sonia Wieder-Atherton. The Grove Dictionary of American Music will include an entry on Laitman in their 2012 edition. Her recordings have garnered enthuasiastic reviews, and they are available on her website, Amazon and iTunes. Laitman graduated magna cum laude from Yale College and received her Master of Music degree from The Yale School of Music. For more information, please visit artsongs.com or scarletletteropera.com.
Bradley Hills Presbyterian Church
6601 Bradley Boulevard
Bethesda, Maryland 20817