FULL PROGRAM:
Bach Christmas Oratorio, Part V: Ehre sei dir, Gott, gesungen
Bach Christmas Oratorio arias
Festive arrangements of Beloved Christmas Carols:
- O Come All Ye Faithful
- Hark! The Herald Angels Sing
- Once In Royal David’s City
Handel Messiah excerpts:
- “Overture”
- “Comfort Ye”
- “Every Valley”
- “Pifa”
- “Rejoice greatly”
FEATURED SOLOISTS:
Elissa Edwards, soprano
Rebecca Printz, alto *
Min Jin, tenor
Eliam Ramos, bass**
*The alto soloist for this concert is endowed in memory of Rev. John and Margaret Lovejoy
**The bass for this concert is endowed in honor of Dr. Philip Sticha
Rejoice in the season with an uplifting and celebratory concert of Holiday music the whole family can enjoy. The program opens with the exuberant Bach Christmas Oratorio, Part V: Ehre sei dir, Gott, gesungen (Praise be sung by you, God), a cheerful and optimistic work featuring two oboe d’amores—one of Bach’s favorite instruments. Then, enjoy a festive arrangement of beloved Christmas Carols including O Come All Ye Faithful, Hark! The Herald Angels Sing, and Once In Royal David’s City. The concert concludes with excerpts of Handel’s magnificent Messiah. Bach in Baltimore Music Director T. Herbert Dimmock has conducted more than 100 performances of Handel’s Messiah over the course of his career. “Those many concerts have taught me that Handel’s greatest masterpiece contains innumerable treasures which continue to reveal themselves in each concert,” says Dimmock. We guarantee you will leave filled with the spirit of the season as our “Hallelujah Chorus” ushers in a time of gratitude, goodwill, and magic.
Elissa Edwards, Soprano
Soprano Elissa Edwards is an exponent of Early Music and hailed for her ‘pliant, seductive, free-ranging voice’ (Gramophone) and her ‘glistening tone’ (Early Music America). She is also a sacred music specialist and has been a featured soloist in many oratorio and cantata performances in the US and UK. Performance highlights include featured appearances at the Washington National Cathedral, the Barbara Strozzi Symposium at Princeton University, Gotham Early Music Series, Bach in Baltimore, American Harp Society, Amherst Early Music Festival, Yorkshire Baroque Soloists and The National Center for Early Music, UK. Ms. Edwards is the artist-in-residence of the Hammond-Harwood House Museum and is on the voice faculty at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C.
Ms. Edwards has won many awards and grants for her creative contributions to the field including the Maryland State Individual Artist’s Award, the National Endowment for the Humanities and Winterthur Museum & Library for her scholarly presentations of music. Her training includes studies at the Royal College of Music, London and performance degrees from Boston University (BM) and University of York, UK (MA). Her critically acclaimed album, Vago Desio, features cantatas and arias from Barbara Strozzi’s Opus 8 (Acis APL90277) is available to listen online. (www.elissaedwards.com)
Rebecca Printz, mezzo-soprano
Mezzo-Soprano Rebecca Printz has performed as a Bach soloist with the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Tanglewood Music Center, and Boston’s Emmanuel Music. Rebecca recently participated in Yellow Barn’s summer music festival, where she performed chamber works by Salvatore Sciarrino, George Benjamin, and Brett Dean, among others. She has also spent two summers at the Marlboro Music festival, where she performed a number of seminal chamber works, including Chausson’s “Chanson Perpétuelle”, Bach solo alto cantata BWV 170, “Vergnügte Ruh”, and the Brahms’s Liebeslieder Walzer. Rebecca is a recent graduate of Boston University’s Opera Institute, where her roles included Baba the Turk in Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress, Hannah After in Laura Kaminsky’s chamber opera As One, and the title role in Dolores Claiborne by Tobias Picker. Her concert work in Boston included a performance with Winsor music as the soloist in Bach’s cantata BWV 82, “Ich habe genug”, and John Harbison’s chamber work “The Seven Ages” with Collage New Music. Rebecca earned her graduate degree at Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, where role highlights included Madame de la Haltière in Massenet’s Cendrillon, Paquette in Candide, and Zita in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi. Rebecca earned her undergraduate degree at Oberlin College and Conservatory, where she sang the title role in Benjamin Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia.
Dr. Min Jin, tenor
Tenor Dr. Min Jin has a versatile and wide-ranging career as a leading operatic tenor, recitalist, conductor, and voice professor. Praised for his easy lyricism, emotional intensity, and extraordinary top notes, Dr. Jin has delighted audiences throughout the world. He has appeared at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center as a recitalist, opera performer, and oratorio soloist with choral societies. His past opera performances include leading roles in La Boheme, Lucia di Lammermoor, Romeo et Juliette, Carmen, L’elisir d’amore, The Magic Flute, La Rondine, La Traviata, Tosca, Manon, Werther, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, and La Vera Costanza. He has performed with the New Jersey State Opera, Ann Arbor Opera, Aspen Opera, Rochester Mercury Opera, Dicapo Opera, Academic Opera, Mannes Opera, Eastman Opera, Grand Valley State University, Kwang Ju City Opera, and Po Hang City Opera.
As an oratorio and chamber music soloist, he has been featured in Carmina Burana and Britten’s Serenade for Tenor, Horn, and Strings with the Finger Lake Music Festival and the Grand Valley State University. Other featured solo engagements have included Haydn’s Creation and The Seasons, Handel’s Messiah, Mozart’s Coronation Mass and Requiem, Dubois’ The Seven Last Word of Christ, Mendelssohn’s St. Paul and Elijah, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, Mass in C Major and Symphony No. 9, Frank’s Mass in A Op. 12, and Schubert’s Mass No. 2 in G and Mass in A flat with orchestras in the U.S. and around the world.
He was a first prize winner of the Artist International Music Competition, Korean Music Association Competition, and a winner of the Heida Hermann International Voice Competition, the Oratorio Society Voice Competition, and a finalist in the Caruso International Voice Competition.
Dr. Jin holds a D.Mus.A. degree in vocal performance from the Eastman School of Music. He served as a principal conductor for the Tedeum Choir in Chicago and as the orchestra conductor at the Central Wesleyan Church in Holland. As a studio voice teacher, many of Dr. Jin’s students are awarded at voice competitions, festivals, and young artist programs at the national and international levels. He currently works as an assistant professor of voice at Towson University.
Eliam Ramos, bass-baritone
Eliam Ramos is a thrilling Puerto Rican bass-baritone who has performed opera and concert works with companies in the United States, Spain, Israel and Mexico. His artistic engagements range from traditional opera such as Leporello in Don Giovanni, to Luis Nogales in the zarzuela Luisa Fernanda, to symphony concerts such as Fauré’s Requiem to the title role of the modern composition of El Cimarrón by Hans Werner Henze.
Mr. Ramos’ will be featured in several productions of La Bohème in the fall season of 2022. He’s contracted to sing Schaunard with Soo Theatre in Michigan, and also engaged with The Metropolitan Opera Guild as a featured soloist in their 2022-2023 season.
First Evangelical Lutheran Church
3604 Chatham Road, Baltimore
FREE parking available on site.
First Evangelical Lutheran Church is a congregation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Founded in 1875, First moved to its present site in 1956, and has undergone several building additions, culminating in the present eight-sided sanctuary dedicated in 1996.
Learn more here.
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