Upcoming

Singing for Liberation

Our 2020 season features two works focusing on the theme of liberation from unjust imprisonment: Beethoven’s Fidelio, and Verdi’s Defiant Requiem.

Fidelio is a dramatic story about a woman who disguises herself as a man in order to get a job at a jail where her husband is being held as a political prisoner. It will be presented in collaboration with Amnesty International and the Ohio Innocence Project, who will lead presentations and discussions on criminal justice reform one hour before each performance.

Defiant Requiem: Verdi at Terezín, a profoundly moving multimedia concert-drama, combines the magnificent music of Verdi with video testimonials and narration, to tell the story of the courageous Jewish prisoners in the Theresienstadt Concentration Camp (Terezín) who performed the celebrated Verdi Requiem while experiencing the depths of human degradation. With only a smuggled score, they performed the famous oratorio sixteen times, including one performance before senior SS officials from Berlin and an International Red Cross delegation. Conductor Rafael Schächter told the choir: “We will sing to the Nazis what we cannot say to them.” Presented by arrangement with The Defiant Requiem Foundation, and in collaboration with the Nancy & David Wolf Holocaust & Humanity Center.