GENESEO, N.Y. – Three well-known choral and instrumental music companies — the Geneseo Festival Chorus, Geneseo Chamber Singers, and the Geneseo Symphony Orchestra — are performing Giuseppe Verdi’s grand “Requiem Mass” April 30 at 3 p.m. in SUNY Geneseo’s Wadsworth Auditorium. Also featured will be guest soloists Elena O’Connor, soprano; Ashley Hibbard, mezzo-soprano; Joshua Bouillon, tenor; and Alan Cline, baritone.
The concert is under the direction of Gerard Floriano, director of choral activities and chair of the Department of Music.
“We are very excited to bring together all of these talented musicians to offer this magnificent work for our community and region to experience,” said Floriano. “Verdi’s ‘Requiem’ is the most popular and often-performed major choral work alongside Mozart’s ‘Requiem.’ It will be a powerful experience for our audience.”
Composed by Verdi in Paris in 1873, he composed the final movement, the “Libera me,” first as a tribute to Gioachino Rossini who died in 1868. It was to be part of a collaboration on a requiem in Rossini’s honor alongside 12 other famous Italian composers of the time. When this project was abandoned by the organizers, Verdi was inspired to finish the work five years later upon hearing of the death in 1873 of the Italian writer and humanist Alessandro Manzoni, whom Verdi had known and admired. For this reason, the work is sometimes called the Manzoni Requiem.
Tickets for the performance are $10 for adults and $5 for students, available only at the door.
Media contact:
David Irwin
(585) 245-5529
Irwin@geneseo.edu