Five Boroughs Music Festival Announces 2023 Winter/Spring Season

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
   PR Contact: Katlyn Morahan | Morahan Arts & Media 
katlyn@morahanartsandmedia.com | 646.378.9386

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FIVE BOROUGHS MUSIC FESTIVAL ANNOUNCES WINTER/SPRING 2023 SEASON

Voices of the New Festival Features Three Concerts with 
World Premiere Performances of New Works at 
Roulette Intermedium, in Partnership with Voices of Ascension 
from January 31 to February 28

Ars Longa de la Habana Makes 5BMF Debut Highlighting the
African Presence in Baroque Music from the New World 
at St. Ignatius of Antioch Episcopal Church on March 15

5BMF Partners with ChamberQUEER for 3 Concerts in Staten Island, Brooklyn, and Manhattan in June

www.5bmf.org

New York, NY (January 11, 2023) — Committed to presenting world-class, affordable chamber music concerts in all corners of New York City, Five Boroughs Music Festival (5BMF) announces its 2023 winter/spring season, featuring three sets of programming. Five Boroughs Music Festival partners with esteemed choral organization Voices of Ascension to present three concerts as part of the Voices of the New 2023 Winter Festival on Tuesday, January 31, 2023 at 7:30 p.m., Tuesday, February 14, 2023 at 7:30 p.m., and Tuesday, February 28, 2023 at 7:30 p.m. at Roulette Intermedium. 5BMF and GEMAS (Gotham Early Music Scene/Americas Society) then co-present Cuban early music ensemble Ars Longa de la Habana in a program highlighting the African presence in baroque music from the New World on Wednesday, March 15, 2023 at 7:00 p.m. at St. Ignatius of Antioch Episcopal Church. In June, 5BMF partners with ChamberQUEER – an ensemble and presenter highlighting LGBTQ voices in classical music – to expand their Pride Month programming throughout the boroughs with three concerts from June 9 to 12 at venues to be announced in Staten Island, Brooklyn, and Manhattan.

Curated by inaugural Voices of the New artist and 5BMF alumna artist Hai-Ting Chinn, each Voices of the New Winter Festival concert features the world premiere performance of a newly commissioned work by a composer who was selected through an open call for proposals issued in late 2021. The new pieces are paired with a selection of old and new works chosen by the members of the ensemble and performed on an intimate scale, offering the audience a chance to connect directly with the ensemble.

On Tuesday, January 31, 2023 at 7:30 p.m., Songs to the Unknown explores singing as a way of connecting ourselves to something larger than our individual selves and features the world premiere of Hannah Selin’s and we fly away. Dedicated to elderly relatives who have passed away in recent years, this piece will set portions of Psalm 90 in various languages, and will explore the impact of past generations on the present. The remainder of the program will explore the themes of death, afterlife, and past generations, and will involve members from diverse religious and non-religious spiritual traditions and the chants and chant-derived music from those traditions.

Love, Loneliness and Lamentation, Tuesday, February 14 at 7:30 p.m. features the world premiere of Max Vinetz’s cheap placeholders for real things for eight voices and string quartet and also includes music from the sweet to the cynical and everything in between. 

The third concert of the Festival on Tuesday, February 28 at 7:30 p.m., Circle in Motion, celebrates the extraordinary power of communal music making to create connections. The program includes the world premiere of Songs in Motion by Raquel Acevedo Klein, which explores the feeling of reconnecting with 

each other after a period of pandemic isolation, and the re-evoking of the feeling of singing together and for an audience. The lyrics will draw on personal narratives that Raquel will collect from members of the ensemble, including neighborhoods they have been part of and random encounters that bring people together in the interconnected landscape of a city, starting with Raquel’s own Puerto Rican and Colombian community and branching out to a variety of communities across the city. 

The three concerts will be performed by the Voices of Ascension Singers and Players, a chamber ensemble drawn from a mix of longtime members of Voices of Ascension, as well as new faces. The Voices of the New Festival was envisioned as a way to spotlight the talents of its individual members and serves as a place for the singers to exercise artistic autonomy and leadership as they collaboratively program and rehearse these concerts, while providing a way for Voices of Ascension to meet new artists, particularly those who come from historically underrepresented backgrounds. Taken together, these three concerts will provide both culturally specific and collective reflections on how a musical community creates art out of the most challenging and comforting experiences that occur for human beings, and how to explore how music and singing together reflect and create community.

In March, Cuban early music ensemble Ars Longa de la Habana makes its 5BMF debut in a program drawing from the ensemble’s 2013 album Gulumbá Gulumbé. Resonancias de África en el Nuevo Mundo. In a concert co-presented by 5BMF and GEMAS, a collaboration between Gotham Early Music Scene (GEMS) and the Americas Society, Ars Longa performs music based on research by Guatemalan musicologist Omar Morales Abril, including several villancicos negros, musical pieces intended primarily for Christmas, as well as poetry, recited by members of the ensemble.

In an effort to expand their 2023 Pride Month programming throughout the boroughs, 5BMF partners with ChamberQUEER for concerts comprising their fifth annual summer series. ChamberQUEER is a Brooklyn-based arts and culture organization that highlights LGBTQ voices in contemporary and historical music and reimagines the classical concert milieu as a radically inclusive community. Together with 5BMF, both organizations will co-present an immersive and participatory experience with performances from June 9 to 12 in venues to be announced throughout Staten Island, Brooklyn and Manhattan, encompassing reflections of queer artistic partnerships throughout history and featuring an ensemble of today's most exciting composer-performers. In addition to offering beautiful and emotionally charged programs, this offering will explore how the networks and connections of our daily and performance life contribute to inform and transform the creative process. This event marks ChamberQUEER's first production in Staten Island.

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Five Boroughs Music Festival Concert Information

Voices of the New 2023 Winter Festival: SONGS TO THE UNKNOWN
Tuesday, January 31, 2023 at 7:30 p.m.
Roulette Intermedium | 509 Atlantic Avenue | Brooklyn NY 11217
Tickets: $20 General Admission; $40 for all three concerts
Link: www.voicesofascension.org/votn

Program to include:
Hannah Selin - and we fly away [World Premiere]

Artists:
Voices of Ascension Singers and Players

Voices of the New 2023 Winter Festival: LOVE, LONELINESS, AND LAMENTATION
Tuesday, February 14, 2023 at 7:30 p.m.
Roulette Intermedium | 509 Atlantic Avenue | Brooklyn NY 11217
Tickets: $20 General Admission; $40 for all three concerts
Link: www.voicesofascension.org/votn

Program to include:
Max Vinetz - cheap placeholders for real things [World Premiere]

Artists:
Voices of Ascension Singers and Players

Voices of the New 2023 Winter Festival: CIRCLE IN MOTION
Tuesday, February 28, 2023 at 7:30 p.m.
Roulette Intermedium | 509 Atlantic Avenue | Brooklyn NY 11217
Tickets: $20 General Admission; $40 for all three concerts
Link: www.voicesofascension.org/votn

Program to include:
Raquel Acevedo Klein - Songs in Motion [World Premiere]

Artists:
Voices of Ascension Singers and Players

Ars Longa de la Habana: Golumbá Gulumbé
Wednesday, March 15, 2023 at 7:00 p.m.
St. Ignatius of Antioch Episcopal Church | 552 West End Ave. | New York 10024
Tickets: Free with RSVP
RSVP Link: https://www.as-coa.org/events/ars-longa-de-la-habana-gulumba-gulumbe 

Program to include:
Selections from Gulumbá Gulumbé. Resonancias de África en el Nuevo Mundo

Artists:
Teresa Paz, soprano and director
Adalis Santiesteban, mezzo soprano
Andrea Trueba, alto
Ariel Hernández Roque, tenor
Yunie Gainza, baritone
Daniel Bernaza Douglas, recorder
Oscar Cañizares, sackbut
Abrahan Castillo, bassoon
Beatriz López Paz, violin and viola da gamba
Arianna Ochoa Mesa, violin and viola da gamba
Aland López, guitar
David Pérez, keyboard

ChamberQUEER
June 9-12, 2023
Staten Island, Brooklyn and Manhattan
Venues to be announced
Link: www.5bmf.org

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About Five Boroughs Music Festival
Since 2007, Five Boroughs Music Festival (5BMF) has brought virtuosic chamber music performances of the highest caliber to every borough of NYC, cultivating new audiences for the genre and encouraging music lovers to look beyond Manhattan for outstanding performances. Lauded as “imaginative” by The New York Times, “enterprising” by The New Yorker, and “vital” by WQXR’s Operavore blog, 5BMF’s commitment to musical outreach and diverse programming has distinguished it as a standout presence in the New York City arts community from its earliest days.

5BMF’s artist roster of over 500 individual performers and ensembles is comprised of talented emerging artists and distinguished musicians alike, representing a diverse range of musical genres and styles. Its venues are just as eclectic, and have included performing arts spaces, cultural centers, and historic New York City landmarks such as Federal Hall, Pregones Theater, Flushing Town Hall, King Manor Museum, Brooklyn Historical Society, the Alice Austen House, and the Staten Island Museum, to name merely a few.

As champions of new music, 5BMF has commissioned over 70 composers and presented world premieres of their works all across New York City, most notably the borough-wide tours of its quinquennial commissioning project, the Five Borough Songbook Volumes I, II and III. 5BMF’s outreach initiatives continue to expand every year, and have included program-related interactive lectures and discussions, public masterclasses with world renowned performing artists, and free public programming. Learn more at www.5bmf.org.

About Voices of Ascension
Voices of Ascension Chorus & Orchestra, founded in 1990 and directed by conductor Dennis Keene, presents exceptional performances of great works of music for chorus and orchestra. Over the course of its 30-year history, Voices of Ascension has produced an annual concert series, released Grammy-nominated recordings, and engaged in artistic collaborations with the San Francisco Symphony, Mostly Mozart Festival, José Limón Dance, the Mark Morris Dance Group, The Metropolitan Museum of Art and others. Recent performances have been described as 'richly colored, impressive, and beautifully balanced' (Wall Street Journal) and 'inspired' (The New York Times).

Dennis Keene, Artistic Director and Conductor of Voices of Ascension, is an internationally renowned conductor. Through his concerts and Grammy-nominated recordings with Voices of Ascension, regular guest appearances as conductor and teacher, and his work as Artistic Director of the Dennis Keene Choral Festival and Voices of Ascension Conductor Academy, he has become one of the preeminent figures in choral music today. Recipient of awards for exceptional artistry from The Juilliard School and Chorus America, Dr. Keene has also served on grants panels for the NEA and NYSCA as well as the board of Chorus America.

About Ars Longa de la Habana
Ars Longa de la Habana, founded in Havana in 1994 by Teresa Paz and Aland López, is dedicated to the performance of Latin American and Cuban colonial music. Over the past 20 years, Ars Longa has performed regularly at the most prestigious music venues of the island and has given concerts and participated in international festivals in Spain, Italy, France, Sweden, Austria, Croatia, Slovenia, Venezuela, Mexico, and Ecuador. In addition to promoting the interpretation of early music in Cuba, Ars Longa hosts the annual international Esteban Salas Early Music Festival in Havana, which brings musicians and ensembles from around the world for concerts and masterclasses. The ensemble has released several CDs that have won recognition and prizes in Europe from Diapason, Le Monde de la Musique, Télérama, and Classica. They have performed on the GEMAS series twice in New York to packed houses.

Soprano Teresa Paz, Ars Longa's co-founder and director, holds a master's degree in Spanish music from the University of Valladolid in Spain and serves as the director of the concert venue at the Church of San Francisco of Paula in Havana, which regularly presents early music concerts. In 1994, she and Aland López formed the early music group Ars Longa, the first of its kind in Cuba. She is also the founder and director of the annual Esteban Salas Early Music Festival, which brings early music players from around the world. It serves as a meeting place in Cuba that through workshops and conferences assists the development of early music performance and interpretation. Teresa was the first to initiate academic plans to teach early music in Cuba. To put her informed historical interpretation into practice, she established the Baroque Orchestra of the Escuela Nacional de Música, Havana. She has attended workshops in early music singing and interpretation with such international specialists as Josep Cabré, Evelyn Tubb, and Claudio Abbado. Teresa has been honored internationally for her recording projects of unknown works by Cuban and other Latin American composers.

About ChamberQUEER
ChamberQUEER is a multifaceted organization with the mission of presenting and performing queer artists, highlighting historically underrepresented queer figures in classical music, and providing an intersectionally inclusive space within classical music for artists and audience. 

CQ questions existing norms of classical concerts: from repertoire and programming, to concert dress and audience etiquette, CQ “queers” the experience of classical music, making it an inclusive and inviting space for all. 

Founded in 2018 by Jules Biber, Danielle Buonaiuto, Brian Mummert, and Andrew Yee, ChamberQUEER is anchored by its flagship concert series, held annually in Brooklyn in June during Pride. Highlighting local queer artists past and present, the festival was a 2019 New Yorker-recommended event and a 2022 New York Times Best of Pride event. In 2020, ChamberQUEER hosted the festival virtually: ChamberQUEERantine was a sixteen-day online broadcast event with over 50 queer artists presenting original work for free during the pandemic.

In addition to the flagship concert series, ChamberQUEER hosts community events throughout the year, from reading parties to house concerts. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it transitioned to online and outdoor events, holding space for the community through Zoom happy hours, Instagram Live interviews with queer composers, educational webinars, and Zoom chamber music concerts in collaboration with other LGBTQ service organizations.

Under the ChamberQUEER Presents… banner, ChamberQUEER co-produces events both virtual and in-person, to amplify the work of queer artists who are producing art for their communities. These productions typically benefit a charitable organization aligned with their mission and values.

ChamberQUEER has been presented by National Sawdust; WQXR at the Greene Space; Death of Classical at Green-Wood Cemetery; Brooklyn Pride; Boulanger Initiative; and the Westerlies. Founding members have had appearances as ambassadors for ChamberQUEER at chamber music festivals, on podcasts and public radio broadcasts, and at residencies all over the country. CQ also works to promote queer musicians in the larger musical scene, helping to contract queer musicians for various events. 

ChamberQUEER is looking forward to providing education and advocacy tools to uphold its mission in a greater variety of spaces, through residencies at educational institutions and through the building of a resource library for other presenting institutions and performing ensembles, which will be made freely available via its website. CQ has worked with Luna Lab, a composition program for young composers of marginalized genders; the Canton Symphony Orchestra’s Orchestrating Change programs; and is looking forward to partnerships with service organizations like SAGE.

Photo at top of release of Voices of Ascension

 

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