All in the course of one week!  Last weekend I had the pleasure of working with The Rose Ensemble as we did a residency at the Christian Theological Seminary in Indianapolis.  This residency consisted of participating in a conference in which we shared our music of Three Faiths – Christianity, Judaism and Muslim.  We have been working with this music for some time know and this has become one of more popular touring programs.

Last weekend we took this program back to our home base and performed it for the Twin Cities.

The program has become so polished and the languages are becoming easier to work with.  If you asked me 10 years ago if I would be singing in Arabic, I probably would have giggled that thought out of my head.

We premiered two new commissioned pieces by composer, John Rommereim.  John is on sabatical this year from Grinnel College in Iowa and has written some remarkable works for us this season as our composer in residence.  These two newest pieces were written for womens voices and mixed ensemble, both accompanied by lap harp.

The first piece entitled, “Garden Among the Flames”  sung in Arabic and English, is based on ‘Arabi’s most famous and oft-quoted poem, in which he declares “I profess the religion of love; wherever its caravan turns, that is the belief, the faith I keep.”

The second entitled, “Poem of Light” is a setting of a poem on the delights of spring by a medieval Spanish writer who is known by the single name Nahum. It is sung in Hebrew, with the transliteration and translation provided by Peter Cole, 2008 MacArthur fellow, and author of “The Dream of the Poem.”

During this hectic week, Twin Cities Public Television (TPT) was around filming us for a documentary on The Rose Ensemble that will air on Minnesota Public Television stations on May 31st.  In addition to TPT filming snippets from our touring shows and educational programs,  I had the pleasure of being one of three Ensemble members that was interviewed, so we’ll see how that came out!

As always, I welcome your comments!  Stay well, stay happy.

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