Glorious Life

Concert Details

Alexander Mickelthwate, conductor
Teng Li, viola
Canterbury Voices

• THEOFANIDIS: Rainbow Body
• KANCHELI: Styx
• PÄRT: Festina Lente
• STRAUSS: Death and Transfiguration

Guest Artists

NOTES FROM THE MAESTRO

“Our Glorious Life concert is deeply personal. And I’m really excited for it.  Birth and death are the most profound and mystical occurrences of the human life cycle. There is nothing more celebrated or mourned than the ‘into’ and ‘out of’ our human life. And there is nothing more questioned than the ins and outs. Where did we come from? Where do we go? Is there life before life? Is there life after death? Who knows the answers?  We turn to religion, spiritual practices, psychics, priests, gurus, doctors.  Books have been written about different accounts of people with Near Death Experiences.

I guess the most famous story in Western culture is the account of Jesus and our celebrations of Christmas and Easter, a worldwide phenomena directly linked to birth and death.  Artists, poets and composers made it the theme of many of their works.  With this in mind, this particular Classics features mystical works directly connected to different moments in the transition process, from this life to another.

Christopher Theofanidis is creating a magical musical scene depicting the Rainbow Body, the Tibetan experience of a dying enlightened master disappearing into the eternal light.  Georgien composer Kancheli composed a dramatic score of the River Styx, describing the Greek myth of a river dividing this world with the Underworld.  And Richard Strauss’ tone poem Death and Transfiguration leads the listener through this dramatic journey all the way to absolute peace and light. Transcending all earthly woes.”