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Silent Voices: If You Listen (2018)

If You Listen, the second installment in the Silent Voices series, builds on the success of its 2017 premiere at BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House, co-commissioned with Brooklyn Academy of Music, and WQXR, New York. In Silent Voices: If You Listen, eight composers, all women, collaborate with the choristers in confronting the challenges of division and categorization, racism, sexism, social and economic disparity, immigration, our environment, and threats to our understanding of truth, as we prepare to move towards a more inclusive and compassionate vision of the future. Featured composers include Julia Adolphe, Olga Bell, Anna Clyne, Paola Prestini, Toshi Reagon, Shaina Taub, Shelley Washington, Bora Yoon. 

Produced and Performed by: Brooklyn Youth Chorus with special guest Shaina Taub
Conceived and Conducted by: Dianne Berkun Menaker

If You Listen Composers: 
Julia Adolphe, Olga Bell, Anna Clyne, Paola Prestini, Toshi Reagon, Shaina Taub, Shelley Washington, and Bora Yoon

If You Listen Librettists: 
Caitlin Doyle, Maija Garcia, Jane Hirshfield, Toshi Reagon, Brenda Shaughnessy, Safiya Sinclair, Shaina Taub, Lord Alfred Tennyson, and Shelley Washington

Director: R. B. Schlather
Video Designer: S. Katy Tucker
Sound Designer: Garth MacAleavey
Dramaturg: Peter McCabe
Chorister Interviews: Helga Davis
Chorus costumes provided by rag & bone

Silent Voices is a multimedia, multi-composer, and multi-year series of concert works with spoken word conceived, produced and performed by Brooklyn Youth Chorus. Silent Voices amplifies the voices of those silenced or marginalized and harnesses the power of young people to be instruments of change. The Chorus has commissioned a diverse group of innovative artists to interpret rich personal stories and historical narratives exploring contemporary themes of identity, orientation, status, boundaries and belonging.

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