Ned Rorem News

For over 45 years, Musica Sacra has delighted audiences with its annual performances of Handel's Messiah.

During the 2010-2011 and 2011-2012 seasons, 33 U.S. opera companies both large and small and from coast to coast will perform works - including nine world premieres - by American composers, announced OPERA America, the national service organization for opera.

On Saturday, October 23, 2010, at 8:00 PM, Musica Sacra opens its 46th season with a program featuring three great Baroque masters. The concert opens with Vanitas Vanitatum (Vanity of Vanities) by the revered Italian Baroque composer, Giacomo Carissimi.

Musica Sacra is pleased to announce its 2010-2011 season of four programs featuring the acclaimed Musica Sacra Chorus and Orchestra and a stellar cast of internationally acclaimed soloists under the leadership of Music Director Kent Tritle.

On Saturday, October 23, 2010, at 8:00 PM, Musica Sacra opens its 46th season with a program featuring three great Baroque masters. The concert opens with Vanitas Vanitatum (Vanity of Vanities) by the revered Italian Baroque composer, Giacomo Carissimi.

What do Walt Whitman, the rapture, and a gay bath house all have in common? Those are among the unusual subjects explored in the new gay opera Sextet, with music and libretto by San Diego composer Nicolas Reveles. Sextet sheds light on various aspects of gay desire: for community, for power, for acceptance, for family, for sex and for love. Diversionary Theatre will produce the world premiere of this new gay opera as part of its Queer Theatre-Taking Center Stage program, underwritten in part by The James Irvine Foundation. Sextet will be presented for only four performances between September 30-October 4.

What do Walt Whitman, the rapture, and a gay bath house all have in common? Those are among the unusual subjects explored in the new gay opera Sextet, with music and libretto by San Diego composer Nicolas Reveles. Sextet sheds light on various aspects of gay desire: for community, for power, for acceptance, for family, for sex and for love. Diversionary Theatre will produce the world premiere of this new gay opera as part of its Queer Theatre-Taking Center Stage program, underwritten in part by The James Irvine Foundation. Sextet will be presented for only four performances between September 30-October 4.

NEW YORK FESTIVAL OF SONG (NYFOS) creates intimate concerts that breathe new life into an art form that's rich and emotionally resonant, yet is too often treated as genteel, intellectual, and predictable. Led by founders Steven Blier and Michael Barrett, armed with just two pianos, gorgeous voices, a sense of humor, and a love of words and music-not to mention a deep knowledge of musical culture savvy enough to find the 18th-century gem that speaks to today's sensibilities-NYFOS plunders music's most remote precincts to create evenings of the deepest pleasure.

Musica Sacra is pleased to announce its 2010-2011 season of four programs featuring the acclaimed Musica Sacra Chorus and Orchestra and a stellar cast of internationally acclaimed soloists under the leadership of Music Director Kent Tritle.

This week, the Cornelia Street Cafe will be hosting several musical acts, including Four-handed Fantasies with Jed Distler, The Zozimos Quartet, and much more. For more information and a complete calendar listing, visit www.corneliastreetcafe.com.

The 2010 New York Philharmonic Concerts in the Parks, Presented by Didi and Oscar Schafer, will open with a free joint concert featuring the New York Philharmonic, conducted by Andrey Boreyko, and the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, conducted by its music director, Long Yu, with pianist Lang Lang as one of the soloists, Tuesday, July 13, 2010, at 8:00 p.m., on the Great Lawn in Central Park.

Signature Theatre, winner of the 2009 Regional Theatre Tony Award, presents the Washington premiere of the hit musical comedy [title of show], winner of three Obie Awards and a Tony nomination.

Musica Sacra announces its 2010-2011 Season Concert schedule which include works from classic composers like Bach and Handel and works of up-and-coming composers who will presents premieres in the New York area. More information can be found at www.musicasacrany.com.

On Thursday, May 20 the city of Louisville will be inspired by a moment of its own history with the world premiere of Owsley Brown III's documentary film, Music Makes a City. The timely tale follows two visionaries, Mayor Charles Farnsley and Louisville Orchestra's first Music Director, Robert Whitney as they faced the odds making Louisville, Kentucky and its orchestra world renowned for new music.

The Collegiate Chorale presents George F. Handel's Israel in Egypt on Wednesday, May 12, 2010 at 8pm at the Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, New York University, 566 LaGuardia Place (at Washington Square South), NYC.

Kaufman Center and New York Festival Of Song (NYFOS, www.nyfos.org), acclaimed by New York Magazine as 'The best classical music programming in New York,' will present an all-new program on May 4 and 6 at 8 PM of American composers, including the premiere of Beautiful Ohio, a song cycle by 2009 Pulitzer Prize- finalist Harold Meltzer, with texts of poet James Arlington Wright and composed specifically for the young American tenor Paul Appleby.

Kaufman Center and New York Festival Of Song (NYFOS, www.nyfos.org), acclaimed by New York Magazine as 'The best classical music programming in New York,' will present an all-new program on May 4 and 6 at 8 PM of American composers, including the premiere of Beautiful Ohio, a song cycle by 2009 Pulitzer Prize- finalist Harold Meltzer, with texts of poet James Arlington Wright and composed specifically for the young American tenor Paul Appleby.

Kaufman Center and New York Festival Of Song (NYFOS, www.nyfos.org), acclaimed by New York Magazine as 'The best classical music programming in New York,' will present an all-new program on May 4 and 6 at 8 PM of American composers, including the premiere of Beautiful Ohio, a song cycle by 2009 Pulitzer Prize- finalist Harold Meltzer, with texts of poet James Arlington Wright and composed specifically for the young American tenor Paul Appleby.

On Thursday, May 20 the city of Louisville will be inspired by a moment of its own history with the world premiere of Owsley Brown III's documentary film, Music Makes a City. The timely tale follows two visionaries, Mayor Charles Farnsley and Louisville Orchestra's first Music Director, Robert Whitney as they faced the odds making Louisville, Kentucky and its orchestra world renowned for new music.

Kaufman Center and New York Festival Of Song (NYFOS, www.nyfos.org), acclaimed by New York Magazine as 'The best classical music programming in New York,' will present an all-new program on May 4 and 6 at 8 PM of American composers, including the premiere of Beautiful Ohio, a song cycle by 2009 Pulitzer Prize- finalist Harold Meltzer, with texts of poet James Arlington Wright and composed specifically for the young American tenor Paul Appleby.