© 2024 WRTI
Your Classical and Jazz Source. Celebrating 75 Years!
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations
 
ALERT: there will be maintenance throughout the evening to upgrade the infrastructure for HD-2 and the audio stream. As a result, there may be intermittent outages.

The Philadelphia Orchestra in Concert on WRTI: Mozart's Great Mass in C Minor, July 23 at 1 PM

Westminster Symphonic Choir at Verizon Hall

A glorious work, infrequently heard in the concert hall, will grace the airwaves this Sunday, July 23rd at 1 pm, as the Philadelphia Orchestra, soloists, and the Westminster Symphonic Choir perform Mozart's Great Mass in C minor at the Kimmel Center's Verizon Hall. Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts.

Looking back to the tradition of Bach’s great Mass in B minor, Mozart's C minor mass is filled with extraordinary fugal writing, and was left unfinished by the composer in 1783.

Soloists for the performance are British soprano Lucy Crowe, who made her Philadelphia Orchestra debut in 2011; American mezzo-soprano Kate Lindsey, who makes her Philadelphia Orchestra debut with this performance; American tenor Nicholas Phan, who made his debut in 2011; and French-Canadian bass-baritone Philippe Sly, who made his debut with the Philadelphians in 2014.

Our second Philadelphia Orchestra in Concert re-broadcast of the 206-2017 season also brings us one of the most celebrated works of the 19th century, Franz Schubert’s Symphony No. 8, probably the most famous of all unfinished compositions.

And, to complete the concert, a composition that combines a fascination with the music of the 12th-century German writer, composer, and abbess Hildegard von Bingen with the Tibetan Buddhist attainment of “rainbow body," the concept that when an enlightened being dies physically, the body is absorbed back into the universe as energy or light.

DLH_POIC_161127_Theofanidis.mp3
WRTI's Debra Lew Harder speaks with composer Christopher Theofanidis.

And there is certainly a rainbow of color to be heard in Christopher Theofanidis’s work for large orchestra, Rainbow Body. Filled with soaring melodies that Theofanidis has described as “very sensual and intimate, a kind of communication with the divine,” it’s a work you won’t want to miss.

During intermission, WRTI’s Debra Lew Harder speaks with composer Christopher Theofanidis, and Susan Lewis talks about Mozart’s great choral work with Joe Miller, the Westminster Symphonic Choir’s director of choral activities.

That’s this Sunday, July 23rd at 1 pm. Don’t miss it!

Detailed program notes from the concert at Verizon Hall

Program:

THEOFANIDIS: Rainbow Body

SCHUBERT: Symphony No. 8 in B minor ("Unfinished")

Intermission

MOZART: Mass in C minor

     Lucy Crowe, Soprano

Kate Lindsey, Mezzo-Soprano

Nicholas Phan, Tenor

Philippe Sly, Bass-baritone

Westminster Symphonic Choir

Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Conductor

Gregg Whiteside is producer and host of the Philadelphia Orchestra in Concert broadcasts on WRTI, every Sunday at 1 pm on WRTI 90.1 FM, online at WRTI.org, and on the WRTI  mobile app!Enjoy a rebroadcast of Sunday concerts on Mondays at 7 pm on WRTI HD-2, as part of our new "Symphony at 7" lineup!

Gregg was the host of WRTI's morning drive show from 2012 until his retirement from WRTI in January, 2021. He began producing and hosting The Philadelphia Orchestra In Concert broadcasts in 2013, joining the Orchestra in Hong Kong for the first-ever live international radio broadcasts from that island in 2016, and in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for two historic broadcasts in 2018. You can still hear Gregg as host of the Orchestra broadcasts every Sunday and Monday on WRTI.