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Upcoming: Beggars and Thieves
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Beggars and Thieves is music director Andy Campbell’s adaptation of John Gay's masterpiece, The Beggar's Opera. The opera was wildly successful at its 1728 premiere at the Theatre Royal in Lincoln's Inn Fields. The Beggar's Opera was performed every year throughout the 18th century and was enjoyed in the 19th century as well. Its popularity was renewed by the pre-World War II adaptation, Three Penny Opera by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht. The song “Mack the Knife” is from that adaptation.
The original Beggar's Opera is classified as a ballad opera, a satiric musical play with dialogue between the songs. Gay wrote the script and the lyrics to the songs but none of the music, which was all taken from popular tunes of the day as well as opera arias, church hymns, and folk songs. Since the majority of these tunes are unknown to modern American audiences, Campbell is writing several new songs. “We Likes Money” and “Your Money or Your Life’ are the rousing first two numbers of the show, which should draw the audience right into the story.
The plot centers on the antics of the philandering highwayman, Captain MacHeath, who is romantically entangled with many women but two in particular. One is Polly, whose double-dealing father, Peachum, acts as both a fence for stolen goods and a thief-catcher for those in his gang who don't produce enough. He gets more for their hanging reward than they deliver. The other woman is Lucy, daughter of the equally duplicitous jailor, Lockit, who is in cahoots with Peachum. Peachum's gang of shady and questionable characters is planning an elaborate heist on the Western Road on the outskirts of London. Their bumbling ways bring about an unexpected outcome.
Beggars and Thieves runs April 14-17, 2010, at the Rogers’ Building on campus.
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HOWL Performs Carmina Burana
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 January 23, 2010 -- For the fifth year in a row, HOWL was invited to sing with the University of New Hampshire Concert Choir and Symphony Orchestra. This year's featured piece was Carmina Burana by Carl Orff. The students participated in a full day of rehearsal after practicing here on campus for a few weeks. In the evening more than 300 college and high school students then performed under the baton of William Kempster.
“These annual choral galas at UNH provide an excellent opportunity for high school students to experience performance at a university level,” said Brewster music director Andy Campbell.
Carmina Burana, Latin for "Songs from Beuern," is the name given to a manuscript of 254 poems and dramatic texts from the 11th or 12th century, although some are from the 13th century. The pieces were written almost entirely in Medieval Latin; a few in Middle High German, and some with traces of Old French or Provençal. Many are macaronic, a mixture of Latin and German or French vernacular.
Students and clergy wrote the songs when the Latin idiom was the lingua franca across Italy and western Europe for traveling scholars, universities, and theologians. Most of the poems and songs appear to be the work of Goliards, clergy (mostly students) who set up and satirized the Church. The collection preserves the works of a number of poets, including Peter of Blois, Walter of Châtillon, and the anonymous one, referred to as the Archpoet.
The collection was found in 1803 in the Benedictine monastery of Benediktbeuern, Bavaria, and is now housed in the Bayerische Staatsbibliothek in Munich. Along with the Carmina Cantabrigiensia, the Carmina Burana is the most important collection of Goliard and vagabond songs.
The manuscripts reflect an “international” European movement, with songs originating from Occitania, France, England, Scotland, Aragon, Castille, and the Holy Roman Empire.
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What Sweeter Music, An English Christmas
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December 12 -13, 2009 -- Clearlakes Chorale performed "What Sweeter Music, An English Christmas," directed by Brewster's music director Andy Campbell. Congratulations to Shira Braiterman '13 who made her debut with the professional orchestra on second flute.
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A Wintry Concert
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December 15, 2009 -- HOWL, Chamber Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, and soloists performed a wintry concert in the cozy warmth of an Après-ski living room (Anderson Hall) before heading home for the holiday break.
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Faure's Requiem Dedicated to Victims of War
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 November 6, 2009 -- HOWL, Chamber Orchestra, Wind Ensemble, and soloists performed Gabriel Fauré’s Requiem, dedicating the concert to the memory of those who have lost their lives in the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts.
A Requiem is a Latin Mass for the dead, usually written for a specific occasion and intended for use during a church service. Gabriel Fauré famously commented that he composed his Requiem "for no reason at all…for pleasure, if I dare say so" – although its original impulse may have been the death of his father.
When Fauré began the work in 1887 he had served as Choirmaster at the Sainte Madeleine in Paris for 10 years. He worked on it over a period of years, during which it was performed in various versions. Although it was completed in 1893, it was not published until 1900. In this piece, Fauré sought to break the routine of the regular liturgical style, which he felt could be stale and contaminated by too much theatricality.
Although several versions of the instrumentation have been published, the Brewster ensemble performed a new orchestration by Brewster Music Director Andy Campbell that fits the combined Chamber Orchestra and Wind Ensemble. Below is a short video clip from the concert.
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