Composer Abbie Betinis Presents World Premiere at Chorus pro Musica Concert Sunday, June 5 in Boston

May 30, 2011 - PRLog -- Boston, MA--Chorus pro Musica finishes its 62nd concert season with a program highlighted by the world premiere of "Expectans expectavi," a commissioned piece by composer Abbie Betinis on Sunday, June 5, 2011 at 3 pm at New England Conservatory's Jordan Hall [30 Gainsborough Street, Boston, MA 02116].  

The Chorus will also perform Igor Stravinsky’s well-loved Symphony of Psalms, Felix Mendelssohn’s Motet, Aus tiefer Noth Op. 23 No. 1, Francis Poulenc’s Exultate Deo and Andrew Rindfleisch’s Anthem together with the New England Philharmonic.

Recently (May 27, 2011), Alan Kozinn of the New York Times cited an Abbie Betinis composition as a highlight of a performance by the New Amsterdam Singers, writing, "the freshest of these pieces was the program's finale, Abbie Betinis's inventive, richly melodic 'Long Time Trav'ling.'"

The Minneapolis-based composer Betinis’s music has also been called “superb, whirling, soaring” by the Tacoma News Tribune and “audacious, edgy and thrilling” by the Minneapolis Star Tribune.  In addition, Betinis was named as one of the top “100 Composers Under 40” by NPR Music in April of this year.

A three-time cancer survivor, the 31-year old composer Abbie Betinis is, for the first time, turning her creative lens on herself as she reflects on her past two years with (and now again without) Hodgkin’s lymphoma.  In fact, Betinis has struggled with this illness even longer:  first diagnosed in 1998 as a 18-year-old teenager, she was treated with chemotherapy.  Then the illness returned again at age 29 and she was treated with chemotherapy once more.  Last year, at age 30, the illness came back and this time, she underwent chemotherapy, radiation and a bone marrow transplant.

In recognition of the relationship of this composition with Ms. Betinis’s own experience with cancer, Chorus pro Musica has reached out to the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, The Lymphoma Research Foundation and the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society for this event and has offered friends, staff, family and cancer survivors 200 free tickets to this concert.  The chorus hopes to share Betinis’s spiritual reflection and insight with others who might be particularly ready to hear it.

A singer herself (formerly with the Dale Warland Singers), Betinis is known for music that unfolds with a dramatic, melodic impulse, rhythmic vigor and design.  Her work is fueled by her hope to inspire greater cultural literacy and exchange through new music, and has dwelt especially on giving a contemporary voice to ancient and medieval traditions.

But this Chorus pro Musica commission is different.  

The title of her new eight minute work is "Expectans expectavi" (Poetic translation: “I waited patiently”) and the text includes selections from Psalms 38, 39 and 40, sung in Latin and scored for full chorus with flutes, oboe, English horn, bassoon, French horns, harp, timpani, trumpet, trombone, tuba, piano, bass drum cellos and basses.  Choosing, like Stravinsky, to set selections of text from Psalms 39 and 40, she says this process is different from previous commissions.

“It’s surprising me how much these Latin words ‘sing’ straight off the page,” Abbie says.  “Psalm 39 is a dark prayer – blaming God for disease while at the same time asking for forgiveness, which is fascinating, and so oddly familiar right now.  I find myself moved especially by the question in the text:  ‘And now, what is my hope?  Is it not the Lord?’  Composers are often drawn to text that asks questions because it paves a very clear way for the music to come forward to provide an answer in sound.  This time, though, I don’t know what the answer is.  So I’m sitting at the piano, trying to trust the pen to tell me what happens next.”

Read more about Abbie at www.abbiebetinis.com

Concert tickets for the June 5 performance at Jordan Hall [New England Conservatory, 30 Gainsborough Street, Boston, MA 02116] are $27, $42 and $57 [price includes a $2 restoration fee for Jordan Hall], with discounts available on selected seats for groups, students, seniors and WGBH members.  Reserved seats may be selected and tickets purchased at www.choruspromusica.org, or by phone (24 hours a day, 7 days a week) at 800-658-4CPM (800-658-4276).  For wheelchair-accessible seats, call 617-267-7442.

Chorus pro Musica is a distinguished, independent Boston-based chorus recognized for versatility and excellence in performing traditional, adventurous and seldom-heard works.  The chorus was founded in 1949 by the late Alfred Nash Patterson and quickly built a superb reputation for its professional-level musical standards and innovative programming.  These strengths have led to collaborations with such organizations as the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra as well as with opera companies including the Opera Company of Boston and Commonwealth Opera.

Betsy Burleigh, in her second season as Music Director, has been since 2005 the Music Director of the Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh, a renowned 115-voice chorus founded in 1908 that is the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra's chorus of choice.  Dr. Burleigh has conducted the Pittsburgh Symphony, Opera Cleveland, the Akron Symphony, and the Canton Symphony Orchestras.  She led the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus on an Emmy award-winning benefit concert for the 9/11 Red Cross Disaster Relief Fund, and received the Northern Ohio Live Achievement Award for music direction of Viktor Ullman’s opera Der Kaiser von Atlantis with Cleveland Public Theater.  In February 2009 she conducted the Mendelssohn Chamber Chorus on the Library of Congress concert series in Washington, D.C.  She holds a doctorate in choral conducting from Indiana University and a masters degree from the New England Conservatory of Music.

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