Vermont Philharmonic Orchestra Gems of Opera and Song

The Vermont Philharmonic opens its 66th season with “Gems of Opera and Song”, a concert
program that includes rarely heard music from the ragtime era and the Italian verismo opera.
The program opens with the overture to Scott Joplin’s opera Treemonisha, composed in 1911
but not performed until 1972. Joplin was posthumously awarded the Pulitzer Prize for music in
1976.
The program continues with two versions of the Bamboula, a West Indian dance. Louis Moreau
Gottschalk’s 1848 piano version will be performed by local virtuoso pianist Stephen Brown. The
orchestra will also perform Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s version dating from 1910.
After the intermission, the music of Italian opera takes over with Pietro Mascagni’s 1890 prelude
to Cavalleria rusticana, and music and arias from Umberto Giordano’s 1896 opera Andrea
Chenier. Singers include Elizabeth Perryman, soprano; Adam Laurence Herskowitz, tenor; and
Michel Kabay, baritone.
Celebrating its 66th Season, the Vermont Philharmonic is composed of professional and
talented amateur musicians from throughout Vermont. It is Vermont’s oldest community
orchestra, founded in 1959 by Jon Borowicz, emeritus professor of music at Norwich University.
Since 1993, the Philharmonic’s home base has been the Barre Opera House. Lou Kosma has
been the Music Director of the Philharmonic since 1999.
Program:
Overture to Treemonisha Scott Joplin
Bamboula, Op. 2 Louis Moreau Gottschalk
Stephen Brown, piano
The Bamboula, Op. 75 Samuel Coleridge-Taylor
~ Intermission ~
Prelude from Cavalleria rusticana Pietro Mascagni
Un di all’azzurro spazia from Andrea Chenier Umberto Giordano
Adam Laurence Herskowitz, tenor
La mamma morta from Andrea Chenier Umberto Giordano
Elizabrth Peryman, soprano
Act IV from Andrea Chenier Umberto Giordano
Elizabeth Perryman, soprano
Adam Laurence Herskowitz, tenor
Michel Kabay, baritone