Event

Stabat Mater (1736)

Following the critical and popular success of the December 2013 production of Monteverdi's Vespers of 1610, the Marigny Opera House will present an ambitious new program of Italian Baroque music this June. Vocal Director and mezzo-soprano Mattea Musso and New Resonance Orchestra Conductor Francis Scully have joined forces once again to direct singers and a chamber ensemble in performances of Pergolesi's extraordinary Stabat Mater as well as excerpts from the Lamentations by Alessandro Scarlatti.

The music will be performed by soprano Kathleen Westfall (Director of The 9th Ward Opera Company) and Ms. Musso, accompanied by an ensemble of musicians from the New Resonance Orchestra (string quartet and harpsichord).

Stabat Mater (1736), the last work composed by Neapolitan composer Giovanni Pergolesi, is one of the most celebrated sacred works of the baroque era. Philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau believed the opening movement to be "the most perfect and touching duet to come from the pen of any composer."

Lamentations (1707) ("The Lamentations of Jeremiah") is a masterful cycle set to Biblical texts by another great Neapolitan composer, Alessandro Scarlatti. The piece existed only in manuscript form until 1995, and has been rarely performed or recorded. Excerpts from the cycle will be sung by Ms. Musso and Ms. Westfall, accompanied again by the New Resonance Orchestra ensemble.