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MasterVoices presents O HOW GOOD at the Central Synagogue. Ted Sperling, conductor. Credit Photo: Joe Carrotta
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

MasterVoices Presents a Concert of Jewish Sacred Music at Central Synagogue

Tonight’s O How Good was a celebration of the life of MasterVoices board member Lois Conway and the years of philanthropy and insightful leadership characterizing her service. The venue chosen for this event was inspiring and magnificent and set in New York City’s Central Synagogue, a stunning example of Moorish Revival architecture and a testament to the beauty and richness of Jewish tradition and culture.

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March 25, 2023
Kent Tritle conducting Stabat Mater by David Briggs at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine. Screenshot by Edward Kliszus
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

Light of Paradise at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine

Maestro Kent Tritle opened this “Light of Paradise” program with the strings of his world-class orchestra performing George Walker’s Lyric for Strings (1946). This work set the tone for the contemplative, elegiac, spiritual, and pathos-rich musical experience about to unfold. This music performed in the magnificent Cathedral of St. John the Divine created rich, transcendent sound reverberations of grandeur and timelessness. The orchestra’s offering of the beautiful, memorable Lyric for Strings was an exquisite sonic experience of poignant and profound emotional character.

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March 9, 2023
The American Classical Orchestra presents Healing Bach at the Church of Saint Vincent Ferrer. Photo by Edward Kliszus
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

The American Classical Orchestra presents Healing Bach

The concert featured sopranos Sherezade Panthaki and Corrine Byrne, mezzo-soprano Sylvia Leith, countertenor Daniel Moody, tenors Brian Giebler and Lawrence Jones, and bass-baritones Edmund Milly and Joseph Parrish. This astounding coterie of gifted musicians presented continuously breathtakingly beautiful and inspired performances.

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March 3, 2023
American Symphony Orchestra at St. Bartholomew's Church. Photo by Edward Kliszus
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

Organ and Orchestra by the American Symphony Orchestra

The program opened with Camille Saint-Saëns’ Symphony No. 3 in C minor “Organ” (1886). When the organ spoke at the first poco adagio along with lush strings and harmonies, the amalgam of sound was exquisitely sublime, inspiring reverence and spirituality from Saint-Saëns’ melodic prose.

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January 28, 2023
Kent Tritle Conducts Musica Sacra at Carnegie Hall. Photo credit: Brian Hatton
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

Musica Sacra at Carnegie Hall

Maestro Kent Tritle and Musica Sacra delivered an elegant, nonpareil performance expressing the radiant afflatus of Handel’s artistic and spiritual masterpiece Messiah. The exquisite sound of the orchestra with period bows performed by orchestral virtuosos and Tritle‘s attention to purity and detail ensured the finest manifestations of Handel’s choral intentions. The ensemble delightfully conveyed the confidence and security of Handel’s musical counterpoint to elaborate the vital significance of the text, melody, harmonic structures, and the composer’s notable departures from antiquarian pedantry into the dash, freedom, and spontaneity of musical evolution.

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December 23, 2022
Text superimposed on The Siege by James Little. Oil and Wax on Canvas. 2003. Private Collection, NY
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

Duke Ellington Sacred Concerts

For the first time in 35 years, Duke Ellington’s Sacred Concerts returned to the stage. Envisioned initially by Ellington as a “Festival of Grace,” provenance for Sacred Concerts is informed by a broad spectrum of jazz, classical and choral music, spirituals, dance, gospel, and blues. Ellington’s compositional product in this venue consisted of a triptych of 34 songs originally recorded in 1965, 1968, and 1973 respectively. It can be argued that an august Ellington facing his mortality considered his Sacred Concerts among his most significant works.

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November 15, 2022
American Classical Orchestra musicians and chorus. From aconyc.org
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

The American Classical Orchestra presents REMEMBER

The performance of Mozart’s Requiem, K526, was glorious and ecstatic. The sui generis admixture of rich sounds from soloists, chorus, and orchestra was superb. At the same time, the sumptuous luminosity of the famed Lacrimosa was almost more than an emotive listener could process without soulful introspection.

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October 29, 2022
Kent Tritle and Musica Sacra. Photo: Musica Sacra
Choral Music
Edward A Kliszus

Maestro Kent Tritle and Musica Sacra

Maestro Kent Tritle et al delivered an inspiring, splendid, diverse, and exciting musical program. Blend, articulation, intonation, and phrasing were superb, and conducting was precise and expressive.

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March 22, 2022

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