The Washington Chorus & National Philharmonic Present Bach's MAGNIFICAT and More in October

The Washington Chorus and National Philharmonic will partner to present the program One Song: Exultávit! at The Music Center at Strathmore on Saturday, October 25 at 7:30 p.m. Conducted by TWC Artistic Director Eugene Rogers, the concert features soloists Juliet Schlefer (soprano), Shabnam Abedi (mezzo-soprano), Heather Petrie (contralto), Jacob Perry (tenor), David Miranda (tenor), Edmund Milly (bass-baritone), and Andrew Smith (bass), as well as instrumentalists Amit Kavthekar (tabla) and Rajib Karmakar (sitar). This marks the fifth collaboration between the two organizations under Eugene Rogers' baton. 

"National Philharmonic is proud to mark the fifth year of our partnership with The Washington Chorus through One Song: Exultávit!" said NatPhil President and CEO Jim Kelly. "This program highlights the strength of our collaboration and our shared commitment to presenting music that connects and inspires our community."

One Song: Exultávit! brings together musical traditions from both East and West, to highlight shared humanity and cross-cultural identity. Reena Esmail's extraordinary work, This Love Between Us: Prayers for Unity, perfectly melds Western and Indian classical music, composed to be performed alongside J.S. Bach's beloved setting of the Magnificat. The pairing allows for the exploration of prayer, humility, and kindness, imagining a future where more unites us than divides us-and the least among us matter the most.

"The Washington Chorus is committed to both historic choral works as well as music of the present day," said Artistic Director Eugene Rogers. "And this concert is a perfect example of how both of those endeavors go hand in hand. We have the past with Bach's Magnificat, and the present with Reena's This Love Between Us, and I feel that they enhance one another in a way that neither could alone."

The concert opens with J.S. Bach's Magnificat, a powerful setting of the classic text from the Gospel of Luke, about the Virgin Mary's visit to her cousin Elisabeth. The Magnificat was Bach's first major liturgical work in Latin instead of German, as well as his first major composition after his appointment in Leipzig in 1723 - then revised ten years later. At the time it was written, it was the dawn of the Enlightenment, with a deeply religious Europe still recovering from the Thirty Years' War. Despite the removal of saints and intermediaries in the Lutheran Church after the Protestant Reformation (including much of the emphasis of Mary), the Magnificat was still an important part of religious services in Bach's era, connecting Protestant practice and Catholic tradition. For instance, the Magnificat would have been performed in German during vespers, except on important feast days where it would be performed in Latin. While Mary was not idolized as a saint in the Lutheran church, she was venerated for her humility, humanity, and faith, which Bach sought to capture in the 12 movements of his setting.

"Bach's Magnificat has been one of the most important works of my career. From an undergraduate project to the present day, I've lived with the work for nearly 30 years - but I've only been able to conduct it once," said Rogers. "Yet it was actually Reena's work that cemented the Bach on the program. As part of The Washington Chorus' commitment to sharing a wide variety of diverse stories, it became clear that this was the right time to tell her particular story as an Indian American."

Reena Esmail composed This Love Between Us: Prayers for Unity to be paired side-by-side with Bach's Magnificat as a contemporary counterpoint. The work for chorus, orchestra, sitar, and tabla was premiered by Yale Schola Cantorum and Juilliard415 at Lincoln Center in 2017. Much like Western classical music is intrinsically linked with the history of Christianity, so too are the classical traditions of Hindustani music with several key religions in India. This Love Between Us juxtaposes texts from the seven major religion traditions of India - Buddhism, Sikhism, Christianity, Zoroastrianism, Hinduism, Jainism, and Islam - to explore how they each approach the topics of unity and harmony from a contemporary perspective. Instead of drawing attention to what makes these religions different, Esmail elevates the commonalities between them, such as the ritual of prayer, and the emphasis on love and goodness.

"Each text is itself a union: it is set simultaneously in English and in its original language, so you can hear the beauty of the original and grasp its meaning through translation," said composer Reena Esmail in her program notes. "Each movement also contains a unique combination of Indian and Western classical styles."

Not only is the musical style a conversation between East and West, but the instrumentation as well. The work combines a Baroque orchestra and Western choir with solo sitar and tabla that perform in conversation with one another. Western choral textures are offset by passages for solo singers who vocalize in a traditionally Indian method throughout the work. The movements range from fully Western to fully Hindustani, ensuring that the movements are not a flat, homogenous blend, but a wide spectrum that samples from both traditions. It is representative of Esmail herself, who grew up in Los Angeles with a blended Indian family - a Catholic mother and a Muslim father - and established a dual musical identity for herself.

"[The musicians are] asked to keep one hand firmly rooted in their own tradition and training, while reaching the other hand outward to greet another musical culture," said Esmail. "If it is impossible to be in both places at once, or at all, I have striven every day since then to create this hybrid, united world in my music."

"This work will challenge our singers and our instrumentalists, while also giving them something familiar to hold onto while they explore this new style," said Rogers. "I've never worked with sitar and tabla before, and I know that will be true for most of our musicians, and many of our audiences. I think it's incredibly valuable to explore this genre, and that process itself is as much a part of the theme of this concert as the two works themselves."

At its core, this concert invites audiences to examine how we can use different backgrounds to unite instead of divide. It dwells on our shared hopes for our world through moments of deep intuition across cultures and religions-and the joy found within each of them. One Song: Exultávit!'s title and poster art is fittingly inspired by both the second verse of the Magnificat and the text of This Love Between Us' final movement. It is the pairing of the two that brings this concert together, so it was necessary to find a way to represent them both in the complete vision for the performance.

Et exultávit spíritus meus:
in Deo salutári meo.

And my spirit hath rejoiced
in God my Savior.

The lamps may be different, but the Light is the same.All religions, all this singing, one song. - Rumi

Performance Information

One Song: Exultávit!
Saturday, October 25, 2025 at 7:30 pm
The Music Center at Strathmore
Tickets: Starting at $29
Link: https://thewashingtonchorus.org/one-song-exultavit

PROGRAM:

Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 - 1750): Magnificat in D major, BWV 243

- Intermission -

Reena Esmail (b. 1983): This Love Between Us: Prayers for Unity
I. Buddhism
II. Sikhism
III. Christianity
IV. Zoroastrianism
V. Hinduism
VI. Jainism
VII. Islam

ARTISTS: