CORO DE CAMARA NEWS
Women have been composing music for centuries, but even today the voices of women composers are seldom heard. The chamber singers of Coro de Cámara will give audiences a chance to experience some of this wonderful music in their upcoming program Music She Wrote: Celebrating Women Composers.
Concerts will be presented in two different formats at three venues:
Friday, Nov. 16, 7:00 p.m.
Coro in collaboration with Los Alamos High School choirs Schola Cantorum and
Bel Canto
Duane Smith Auditorium
1300 Diamond Drive, Los Alamos
Saturday, Nov. 17, 4:00 p.m.
Coro alone in concert with pre-concert lecture by Dr. Nelly Case at 3:30 p.m.
United Church of Santa Fe
1804 Arroyo Chamisa Road, Santa Fe
Sunday, Nov. 18, 4:00 p.m.
Coro alone in concert with pre-concert lecture by Dr. Nelly Case at 3:30 p.m.
Unitarian Church of Los Alamos
1738 North Sage Street, Los Alamos
The Friday performance is an exciting collaboration with Los Alamos High School. The first part of the concert will feature the award-winning Schola Cantorum mixed choir and Bel Canto women’s choir, both directed by Jason Rutledge. The students will share the works of women composers ranging from the 12th-century abbess Hildegard von Bingen to the contemporary Canadian composer Eleanor Daley. Coro de Cámara will present the second part of the concert and the three choruses will join together on two pieces for the finale.
The Saturday and Sunday performances will feature Coro de Cámara in concert alone with additional pieces, piano solos by the dynamic Natasha Stojanovska and pre-concert lectures by music historian Dr. Nelly Case.
Coro de Cámara Artistic Director Nylea Butler-Moore says, “We are delighted to bring this amazing and too-often-overlooked music to Los Alamos and Santa Fe. Coro audiences will hear a wide variety of music by women from many historical periods.”
Pre-concert lecturer case, who taught courses on women composers at the Crane
School of Music, notes, “The earliest piece in Coro program is a madrigal by Maddelena Casulana, the first woman composer to have her works printed, in 1568. We’ll also hear a song by Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, whose famous brother Felix considered his sister’s musical activity ‘unfeminine and inappropriate’. A number of the other featured women composers also struggled to have their music heard.”
The most recent work will be the world premiere of Nylea Butler-Moore’s “Amid the Noise’, based on excerpts from Max Ehrmann’s poem, “Desiderata”.
“I wrote this piece especially for our collaboration with the high school choruses,” said Butler-Moore. “I wanted to address the hectic, stressful world young people experience, and to encourage them to find a place of peace ad hope, there they can be themselves.”
The concerts will also include choral music by Isabella Leonarda, Ellen Taafe Zwilich, Libby Larsen, and a piece by Lili Boulanger with guest soprano soloist Christina Martos. Natasha Stojanovska will play works by Maria Szymanowski, Amy Beach and Grazyna Bacewicz, as well as her own composition, “Phantasy for Piano”.
All three concerts will close with a stirring spiritual/worksong attanged by contemporary African-American composer Rosephanye Powell.
Tickets are $20 for adults and $10 for students and are available at the door or at corodecamara-nm.org. At the Friday concert, admission for LAHS and LAMS students with ID is just $5.