Many are aware that our dear friend and colleague David Froom died last year, June 19th, 2022. We begin our 2023-24 season with a memorial concert in David’s memory, co-produced with David’s widow and the formidable pianist Eliza Garth, who will also appear as a guest artist on the program. It has been a great pleasure to develop today’s program with Eliza, who is a dear friend and David Froom’s partner for much of his life. We are honored that she identified the Consort as a fit vessel for this celebration of David’s extraordinary music. Please see “In Season” for

Continue readingDavid Froom: echoes, resonance and remembrance

One week after the April 22nd celebration, a musical echo that is environmentally sound

The 21st Century Consort returns to the Hirshhorn with “Sound Shards,” inspired by the Museum’s epic Mark Bradford installation, “Pickett’s Charge.”

Starting November 4, the Opera Philadelphia Channel began streaming The Passion of Scrooge as the inaugural title in its “Opera Philadelphia Presents” series. It’s an exciting way to reach new audiences on their innovative new platform that has big ambitions, to become “the Netflix of opera” for this fledgling hybrid art form. With sincere thanks to Opera Philadelphia, we welcome you to subscribe at operaphila.tv as another way to watch director H. Paul Moon’s critically-acclaimed adaptation of Jon Deak’s masterpiece.

In an epic addition to the Smithsonian’s Summer Solstice celebration on June 25, the 21st Century Consort partnered with the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden to present John Luther Adams’ vast Earth and the Great Weather for a rapt crowd on the plaza beneath a circle of stars. This “sonic journey through the physical, cultural and spiritual landscape of the Arctic” was captured on video by filmmaker H. Paul Moon, and can now be experienced via the Consort’s YouTube channel by clicking here.

Greeting to everybody; we are looking forward so much to seeing you at our October 9 concert! These days, composers sometimes produce “Midi” versions of pieces they’ve composed. To some, these electronic representations have become increasingly off-putting as they become better at replicating the actual sound of the music. Gene O’Brien says he dislikes midi about as much as I do, but produced one for us anyway. I’m glad he did: it manages to convey some of the challenge and stark power of his “Elegy to the Spanish Republic,” which we’ll be premiering on our upcoming concert and recording right

Continue readingElegy