Pre-concert lecture at 7:15 PM in the lower lobby.

Kenneth Kiesler, conductor, University Symphony Orchestra
Jerry Blackstone, director, Chamber Choir
Eugene Rogers, director, University Choir
Graduate choral students, Orpheus Singers.

The USO and University Choirs join together to perform two great, dramatic and inspiring pieces for large orchestra and large choir. The creative DNA of composer-conductors Bernstein and Mahler was seemingly related. Both were impassioned, extroverted, and nearly frenzied, conductors of the New York Philharmonic. They were achingly introspective, and had an unsettled relationship with religion. In these two pieces of music with voices, they offer us music that rises from the apocalyptic, cynical worlds they at first depict, to sublime visions of unity, transformation, and heavenly bliss.

PROGRAM: Mahler- Symphony No. 2, Kara Mulder, soprano, Rehanna Thelwell, contralto; Bernstein- Chichester Psalms, Andrew Lipian, countertenor