Choral extravaganza on tap in Troy

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ALBANY - On Saturday, April 3, 8 pm at the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall, the Capital Region is in for a real treat as Artistic Director David Griggs-Janower and Albany Pro Musica perform a blockbuster work among the existing choral repertory--Johann Sebastian Bach’s Mass in B Minor--rarely presented in the Capital Region. And, it’s the first time that APM has ever performed the B Minor Mass in its entirety. This “Great Choral Tradition” concert closes out the 2003-2004 season with a program that features the full chorus, professional soloists and orchestra. Written over 25 years but completed at the very end of his life, the B Minor Mass, Bach's last work, is a "tour de force" of Baroque style. Using all of the skills he had mastered in a lifetime of composing, Bach displays an incredibly virtuosity of compositional techniques. Writing for a large, festive orchestra and chorus, he somehow combines the latest in Italian opera style, traditional German fugue, old-fashioned Renaissance polyphonic motet style, and instrumental dance music into a coherent whole. The use of so many styles setting the most basic and traditional of all Christian texts, the mass, makes this grand work a universal statement of Christian belief. The distinguished soloists for this performance are soprano Susan Harwood, mezzo-soprano Lucille Beer, tenor Bryce Westervelt and bass David Arnold. Soprano Susan Harwood has been praised for her “purity of tone and soaring line”. She has appeared with the York Symphony as soloist in Brahms’ German Requiem, performed Mozart’s Exsultate, Jubilate with the Knoxville Chamber Orchestra under conductor Zoltan Rozhnyai, and has sung the Bach solo cantata Jauchzet Gott in Allen Landen with the chamber orchestra “Concertante.” As a member of Concert Artists of Baltimore, she was a frequent soloist in works of the Baroque period, including the Bach Mass in B minor, and was presented in a program of Mozart arias and duets at the Walters Art Gallery. Ms. Harwood has sung with the Lake Trio, the Huntingdon Trio and the Easterly Chamber Players, and appeared with Theater Chamber Players at the Kennedy Center. She performed the Shostakovich Seven Romances on Poems of Aleksander Blok at Catholic University in Washington, DC. Composer Paul Zeigler wrote a song-cycle for her on nine poems of e.e.cummings which she premiered at Peabody Conservatory. Mezzo-soprano Lucille Beer has received international acclaim for her performances in opera houses and concert stages around the world. Ms. Beer made her Metropolitan Opera debut in 1983 in Ravel’s L’Enfant et les Sortileges and since that time has appeared in numerous other productions. In addition to opera, Ms. Beer regularly performs in Lieder recitals and oratorios and has appeared with such orchestras as the New York Philharmonic, the St. Louis Symphony, the Houston Symphony, Prague Radio Symphony, North Carolina Symphony, Colorado Springs Symphony, Duluth Superior Symphony, Evansville Philharmonic, Festival, Las Cruces Symphony and Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg. She is a frequent soloist with the Albany Symphony Orchestra and Albany Pro Musica. Tenor Bryce Westervelt has been a featured soloist with several groups in the Mid-Atlantic, Northeast and across the United States, performing much of the standard concert repertoire with such groups as the Washington Bach Consort, Cathedral Choral Society, Folger Consort, Carmel Bach Festival, Masterworks Chorus, National Chamber Orchestra, Fairfax Choral Society, CONCORA, Laurel Oratorio Society, Alexandria Chorale, Maryland Copland and Handel Festivals, Rockbridge Choral Society, Assabet Valley Mastersingers, Concord Chorus, Metropolitan Chorus, Manchester (CT) Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, and the National Chamber Singers among others. His extensive concert repertoire includes Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610, Bach’s Mass in B Minor, Magnificat and St. Matthew Passion (arias), Handel’s Messiah and Susanna, Haydn’s Lord Nelson Mass, Seasons and Creation, Mozart’s Coronation Mass, Mass in C-Minor and Requiem Mass, Beethoven Symphony No. 9, Rossini’s Petite messe solennelle and Stabat Mater, Mendelssohn’s Elijah and St. Paul, Dvorak’s Stabat Mater, Honneger’s King David, Britten’s Saint Nicolas, and Cameron’s Missa Celtica. Baritone David Arnold has scored successes in symphonic music performing the Bach Passions with Robert Shaw, Helmuth Rilling, Richard Westenburg, Harold Rosenbaum, Blanche Moyse, Sergio Comissiona, and Norman Scribner. And for six seasons Seiji Ozawa has chosen him as soloist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Mr. Arnold has also performed major works with the orchestras of Philadelphia, Chicago, San Francisco, Baltimore, Detroit, Atlanta, Houston, Hartford, St. Louis, New Haven, the American Symphony the American Composers Orchestra, et al. In opera, David Arnold has won acclaim as Enrico in Lucia, Ford in Falstaff, and the Count in The Marriage of Figaro performed at the Philadelphia Academy of Music, and for L’Opera de Quebec; his appearances as Emperor Jones in that opera’s revival prompted a comparison by the composer’s widow of David Arnold to Lawrence Tibbett, whom she saw create the role at the Met in 1933. The composer John Harbison has twice chosen Mr. Arnold for starring roles in world premieres of his operas Winter’s Tale and Full Moon in March. His debut at the New York City Opera as Zurga in Pecheur de Perles was widely acclaimed by the New York press. Mr. Arnold has sung Amonasro in Aida with the Opera Company of Boston (opposite Shirley Verrett), and elsewhere with conductors Sarah Caldwell, Badea, Choset and DeMain. He has performed Creon in Oedipus Rex in San Francisco and Dandini in La Cenerentola with the Virginia Opera, and appeared as Escamillo in Carmen opposite Cossotto and Luchetti with Tulsa Opera. He appears regularly with the Boheme Opera Company of New Jersey. There will be a pre-concert talk at the Rensselaer County Historical Society, 57 Second Street, Troy at 7 p.m. Tickets for Bach’s Mass in B Minor are $20, $18 and $10 and may be purchased by calling the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall Box Office at (518) 273-0038 or online at www.troymusichall.org . The Music Hall Box Office opens one hour prior to the performance. Otherwise, Box Office operations are handled at its business office at 7 State Street, Monday through Friday 10 a.m.-5 p.m., and on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., on show days only. Albany Pro Musica, founded in 1981, is an auditioned chorus of men and women from seven counties in the Capital Region and surrounding areas. Dedicated to the enhancement of the cultural life in upstate New York and their own musical growth, the choral group, under the leadership of founding conductor David Griggs-Janower, presents professional quality performances of an a cappella and accompanied choral repertoire drawn from diverse traditions and styles ranging from the great masterworks to contemporary and less familiar compositions.
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Lanesborough Fifth-Graders Win Snowplow Name Contest

LANESBOROUGH, Mass. — One of the snowplows for Highway District 1 has a new name: "The Blizzard Boss."
 
The name comes from teacher Gina Wagner's fifth-grade class at Lanesborough Elementary School. 
 
The state Department of Transportation announced the winners of the fourth annual "Name A Snowplow" contest on Monday. 
 
The department received entries from public elementary and middle school classrooms across the commonwealth to name the 12 MassDOT snowplows that will be in service during the 2025/2026 winter season. 
 
The purpose of the contest is to celebrate the snow and ice season and to recognize the hard work and dedication shown by public works employees and contractors during winter operations. 
 
"Thank you to all of the students who participated. Your creativity allows us to highlight to all, the importance of the work performed by our workforce," said  interim MassDOT Secretary Phil Eng.  
 
"Our workforce takes pride as they clear snow and ice, keeping our roads safe during adverse weather events for all that need to travel. ?To our contest winners and participants, know that you have added some fun to the serious take of operating plows. ?I'm proud of the skill and dedication from our crews and thank the public of the shared responsibility to slow down, give plows space and put safety first every time there is a winter weather event."
 
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