This Bach at One is the first installment of Trinity’s Divine Muse series celebrating Saint Cecilia, whose spirituality and martyrdom have inspired countless works of art, literature, and music. Director of Music Melissa Attebury leads the Trinity Choir and the Trinity Baroque Orchestra in a tribute that includes Bach’s Komm, Jesu, komm; Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild, and Benjamin Britten’s Hymn to St. Cecilia — one of the best-known musical tributes to the saint.
Trinity Choir; Trinity Baroque Orchestra; Melissa Attebury, Director
Young virtuoso Clara Gerdes Bartz grew up in North Carolina and recently graduated from the Yale Institute of Sacred Music, where she studied with renowned professor Martin Jean. The organist has already established herself as a performer of prodigious technique and control. She received the Baker Prize in Organ Performance (2020) and the Julia Sherman Award for Excellence in Organ Playing (2021) and is an adjunct instructor of organ at Rider University’s Westminster Choir College.
The not-to-be-missed Jazz at One finale features a vibrant blend of traditional African music, contemporary hits, infectious energy — and a very special surprise guest.
This season’s Jazz at One, Long Walk to Freedom, is inspired by Nelson Mandela and the 30th anniversary of South African democracy. Presented in collaboration with JAZZ HOUSE KiDS.
“We pattern our lives after Jesus’s teaching and example,” writes the Rev. Matt Welsch, “by putting others first, by caring for those who are outcast, and by positioning ourselves as children of God in need of God’s love and guidance.”
Trinity’s new-music orchestra, NOVUS, continues its series of works that grapple with vital social issues. This season’s NOVUS Renewal: Shelter concerts highlight the experiences of the unhoused and the complex systemic failures that lead to homelessness.
Opening the series is the New York premiere of Gabriel Kahane’s oratorio, emergency shelter intake form. With a libretto based on the questionnaire given to those seeking a bed, the work is a searing portrait of the fear, humiliation, and profound challenges associated with being unhoused in America.
NOVUS; Alicia Hall Moran, soprano; Gabriel Kahane, Holland Andrews, and Holcombe Waller (the chorus of inconvenient statistics); choirs from the Borough of Manhattan Community College; Daniela Candillari, conductor
The Trinity Choir performs one of Bach’s most complex choral pieces, Jesu, meine Freude (“Jesus, my Joy”) as well as two modern Gabriel Kahane pieces of the same title: We are the Saints. The first Kahane work (a New York premiere) grapples with our relationship with nature. The second, a world premiere arrangement of the composer's popular song, weaves personal narratives and social commentary into a compelling reflection on homelessness.
This special Bach at One is part of the 2024–25 NOVUS Renewal: Shelter series, which highlights the experience of the unhoused and the complex systemic failures that lead to homelessness.
Trinity Choir; Gabriel Kahane, soloist and composer; Melissa Attebury, director
