The Eastman-Rochester Chorus and the Eastman Wind Ensemble will present two free performances next month of Anton Bruckner’s Mass in E Minor, considered a masterpiece of blending Renaissance polyphony—independent melodic parts—with Romantic harmonies. The work, for eight voice parts, was commissioned in 1866 to inaugurate the new Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Linz, Austria.
Reaching out into the community, the Eastman School of Music singers and musicians will present the first performance of Bruckner’s Mass in E Minor at 8 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 1, in Sacred Heart Cathedral in Rochester. The program will also feature Bruckner’s motets—a cappella works based on sacred texts—Ecce sacerdos and Os Justi.
The Eastman-Rochester Chorus and the Eastman Wind Ensemble will reprise the work at 8 p.m. Friday, Dec. 7, in the Eastman Theatre. That evening’s program also includes Waking Angels by David Gillingham and Recoil by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and former Eastman faculty member Joseph Schwantner.
Both concerts are free and open to the public.
The Eastman Wind Ensemble, conducted by Mark Scatterday, is composed of a core of 50 undergraduate and graduate students of the Eastman School. Over its 55-year history, the ensemble has made dozens of recordings and has premiered more than 150 new works. In addition, the wind ensemble has done major tours both across the country and abroad. Its 2004 tour of Japan, its seventh in that nation, also included performances in Taiwan and China.
The Eastman-Rochester Chorus, conducted by William Weinert, is a select chorus of rising vocal stars from the Eastman School of Music along with a number of the Rochester community’s finest voices. Each season, the 150-member ensemble presents two large-scale choral masterpieces in the Eastman Theatre accompanied by an Eastman orchestra. Its performance in Sacred Heart Cathedral marks the first time the chorus will appear outside the theatre.
# # #
Calendar Listings:
Saturday, December 1
8 p.m.
Eastman-Rochester Chorus and Eastman Wind Ensemble. Bruckner: Mass in E minor; Ecce sacerdos; Os Justi
Sacred Heart Cathedral, 287 Flower City Park
Free
Friday, December 7
8 p.m.
Eastman-Rochester Chorus and Eastman Wind Ensemble. Bruckner: Mass in E minor; Gillingham: Waking Angels; Schwantner: Recoil.
Eastman Theatre, 60 Gibbs St.
Free