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Resonance Works Opens 14th Season with a Musical Time Capsule


Resonance Chamber Orchestra and Festival Chorus Credit: Res Works

For its 10th season, Resonance Works commissioned a piece by Gilda Lyons titled “An Anchor in Time.” The work didn’t get its world premiere until 2023, but it was not only revisited this year but it also provided a theme for Sunday’s concert at the Carnegie Music Hall in Carnegie.

Res Works is known for its genre defying programming which can feature everything form musical theater and opera to orchestral, choral and chamber music. On Sunday, 38 singers from the Festival Chorus filled the Carnegie stage under the baton of Res Works founder and Artistic Director, Maria Sensi Selner and sang a vocal time capsule of works that spanned 10 centuries.

Maria Sensi Sellner

Accompanied by pianists Robert Frankenberry and Nathalia Kato Giordano., the chorus sang 10 selections, the earliest being a work by 11th century composer and mystic, Hildegarde von Bingen.

The concert moved forward chronologically with works by Claudio Monteverdi, Williametta Spencer, Franz Schubert, Johannes Brahms, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Melissa Dunphy, Margaret Bonds and a spiritual titled “There’s a City Called Heaven,” with featured soloist Michelle Cipollone.

The chorus sang beautifully and adeptly in selections that required them to sing in Latin, German, English, even Cree, the latter being a work by Sheryl Sewepagaham titled “Okawimaw Askey” or Mother Earth.

Two of the selections, the African-American spiritual “There’s a City Called Heaven” and Schubert’s “An die Musik” were arranged by Robert Page, who led the Mendelssohn Choir of Pittsburgh for 25 years and served as assistant conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra.

Mezzo-Soprano Timothi Williams

Following intermission, Res Works reprised its commissioned work, “An Anchor in Time,” sung masterfully by mezzo-soprano Gida Lyons and baritone. Daniel Teadt. The singers were a wonderful match that were musically buttressed by a solid 13-piece ensemble.

Baritone Daniel Teadt

The final work, “Appalachian Spring,” by Aaron Copland was played by 13 instruments using the original scoring. I must admit that I was really moved by the piece as it took me back to my youth. As 22-year-old driving his TR 4-A with the top down through the mountains along old Route 40 just east of Cumberland I had the radio on. Much to my delight, I Copeland’s “Appalachian Spring” started to play  on a warm end of April day in the springtime of my life when the Earth was just coming back from its winter doldrums, fresh and green and flowery. The first few bars of the piece, when the orchestra played that rapturous beginning, I couldn’t help tearing up. It was a very moving end to a wonderful concert.

Future Res Works concerts include “The Little Prince” on Nov. 20-22, “the little match girl passion Jan. 22-24, Rachmaninoff’s “All-Night Vigil,” March 19 & 21 and Verdi’s “Don Carlo,” an opera  not heard in Pittsburgh in 30 years Jun 18 & 20.

For more information, on Res Works and its 14th season, phone (412) 501-3330 or visit https://www.resonanceworks.org/

To listen to a clip of Appalachian Spring. click the following link  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXV8yO1FucA&t=96s. 

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