Orchestra of the Age of Enligtenment: The Open Fund for Organisations
For:
The Judas Passion - Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment
The OAE commissioned an ambitious work, The Judas Passion, from one of the foremost composers of her generation, Sally Beamish. The World Premiere will take place at Saffron Hall and the London Premiere at St. Johns Smith Square on 25 September 2017. The work will be also performed through cost sharing by San Francisco’s Philharmonia Baroque with UK soloists at 4 venues in California in October.
Sally initiated this project to write a passion using the same forces as Bach’s passions and she will collaborate with the major poet David Harsent. The idea of a passion ‘according to Judas’ is to explore the idea of what it is to be human – to fail, to betray – and whether our roles are pre-destined. The orchestral forces focus around the original ‘continuo’ used by Bach. By continuo we mean the core of the baroque orchestra that was fashioned to support vocal lines so that they would be clear, expressive and inspiring.
Supported by these musicians are the chorus and soloists, whose job it is to create the voices and themes of the drama. We can expect hymns or chorales, crowds of anger, joy, sadness and devotion and the great drama of souls in the lead protagonists. We present this work with a first class international team. Sally Beamish and librettist, David Harsent are respected leaders in their artistic domains, as are the soloists including Brendan Gunnell (tenor, Judas), Roddy Williams (baritone, Christ), Julia Doyle, (soprano, Mary) and conductor Nicholas McGegan.