Macmillan: Clemency [Opera] Angus, Boston Lyric Opera

$15.99
Label
BIS
Release Date
October 14, 2014
Format
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    Featuring ⌄
    • COMPOSER
      MACMILLAN SCHUBERT
    • ORCHESTRA / ENSEMBLE
      Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra
    • PERFORMER
      Boston Lyric Opera, Angus, Kravitz, Trainor, Abraham
    Product Details ⌄
    Works ⌄

    1. Introduction: Abraham's Chant (Abraham)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: David Kravitz

      Conductor: David Angus

    2. Hagars Klage (Hagar's Lament), D. 5 (arr. D. Angus for voices, piano and orchestra) (sung in English)

      Composer: Franz Schubert

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: Michelle Trainor, David McFerrin, Brett Hodgdon

      Conductor: David Angus

    3. Scene 1: Abraham's Chant: O Lord, who set the planets turn (Abraham)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: David Kravitz

      Conductor: David Angus

    4. Scene 1: Duet: What is the measure of our years? (Abraham, Sarah)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: David Kravitz, Christine Abraham

      Conductor: David Angus

    5. Scene 2: No-one can walk far in this heat (Abraham, Travellers, Sarah)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: David Kravitz, David McFerrin, Neal Ferreira, Samuel Levine, Christine Abraham

      Conductor: David Angus

    6. Scene 2: Gold has lost its light (Travellers)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: David McFerrin, Neal Ferreira, Samuel Levine

      Conductor: David Angus

    7. Scene 2: Chant of the Travellers (Travellers) - Who are these angels? (Abraham, Sarah)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: David McFerrin, Neal Ferreira, Samuel Levine, David Kravitz, Christine Abraham

      Conductor: David Angus

    8. Scene 2: Three strangers bring a gift to me (Sarah)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: Christine Abraham

      Conductor: David Angus

    9. Scene 3: Who are you? (Abraham, Travellers, Hagar, Sarah)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: David Kravitz, David McFerrin, Neal Ferreira, Samuel Levine, Michelle Trainor, Christine Abraham

      Conductor: David Angus

    10. Scene 4: And the good? (Sarah, Travellers, Abraham)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: Christine Abraham, David McFerrin, Neal Ferreira, Samuel Levine, David Kravitz

      Conductor: David Angus

    11. Scene 5: Sarah's Lament: Months from now (Sarah)

      Composer: James MacMillan

      Ensemble: Boston Lyric Opera Orchestra

      Performer: Christine Abraham

      Conductor: David Angus


Clemency, a chamber opera for five singers and string orchestra in one act; composed 2009-10 and the third operatic collaboration between composer James MacMillan and poet Michael Symmons Roberts to date – is a work exploring a central but enigmatic Old Testament episode. The composer has commented that Clemency is set in the present day and ‘is not intended as an old Hollywood style Biblical drama. Abraham and Sarah are modern people who are visited by three strange but modern figures that, it turns out, have something terroristic about them. There is something of the ancient and the modern in the piece; the ancient, Biblical tale but also the kinds of thing people face today in many parts of the world.’ For the first U.S. production and its world premiere recording, Boston Lyric Opera, with the approval of both composer and librettist, decided to introduce the figure of Hagar, servant to Sarah but also the mother of Abraham’s first child, Ishmael. This is done by incorporating a version of Schubert’s early song Hagar’s Lament as a prelude to this opera, challenging us to measure the impact of our lives in a modern world that continues to be marked politically and spiritually by acts of mercy and acts of vengeance.