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Three critically acclaimed vocalists, four student choral ensembles and a 100-member orchestra will unite to perform “Carmina Burana” on Tuesday (April 13) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Three critically acclaimed vocalists, four student choral ensembles and a 100-member orchestra will unite to perform “Carmina Burana” on Tuesday (April 13) at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Kiera Duffy, soprano; Matthew Plenk, tenor; and Earle Patriarco, baritone, will solo in Carl Orff’s classic cantata, presented at 7:30 p.m., in Memorial Hall as a part of the “Music on the Hill” series, a collaboration between Carolina Performing Arts and the UNC music department.

Performing will be the UNC Symphony Orchestra; the Carolina Choir and the UNC Chamber Singers, directed by Susan Klebanow; the Women’s Glee Club, directed by Sue Klausmeyer, D.M.A; and the Men’s Glee Club, directed by Daniel M. Huff, Ph.D. The directors are members of UNC’s music faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences.

“This is going to be more than a concert,” said UNC music professor Tonu Kalam, orchestra director. “It is going to be an event.”

Also on the program will be the world premiere of “Dysfunctional: A Concerto for Piano and Orchestra,” newly composed by UNC assistant professor of music Stephen Anderson, D.M.A. The orchestra will perform the piece with guest pianist Steven Harlos, a professor at the University of North Texas.

The April 13 performance will mark only the second time that the 200 students in UNC’s four vocal ensembles have performed together. The first was in 2005, to perform Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in Memorial Hall.

Klebanow said choir members were looking forward to working with the soloists, as well as performing such a well-known work in a choir of this size.

“‘Carmina Burana’ is one of the most beloved and requested pieces in the choral repertoire,” she said. “The piece is also vocally demanding and strenuous to sing. With a super-sized choir, we are able to achieve a powerful, dramatic sound that can easily be heard over the orchestra.”

Kalam and Emil Kang, UNC’s executive director for the arts, had the idea for the concert, aiming to create a collaboration among student musical groups and give students an opportunity to learn from professional vocalists.

“At the core of our mission, Carolina Performing Arts is invested in the education and enrichment of Chapel Hill’s artistic communities,” Kang said. “We are excited for the opportunity to use our relationships with artists to build connections with our talented students and thrilled that such collaborations have become a tradition.”

Duffy was a featured artist on “The Audition,” a 2009 documentary about the 2007 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. She has won a Sullivan Foundation grant and performed with the New York Philharmonic and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, as well as at Boston’s Tanglewood Music Center and Carnegie Hall in New York City.

Plenk is in his third year in the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program. He made his Metropolitan Opera debut in “Tristan and Isolde” under the baton of Maestro James Levine. Plenk also has appeared in “Don Giovanni” with the Boston Lyric Opera and “La Bohème” with the Yale Opera.

Patriarco was an Adler Fellow and a member of the Merola Opera Program with the San Francisco Opera and has appeared in the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Seattle Opera. He was nominated for a Grammy Award for his recording of “Carmina Burana” with conductor Donald Runnicles and the Atlanta Symphony for the TELARC label.

After the 1937 Frankfurt premiere of “Carmina Burana,” Orff wrote, “Everything I have written to date, and which you have, unfortunately printed, can be destroyed. With ‘Carmina Burana,’ my collected works begin.”

The movement “O Fortuna,” which opens and closes the piece, has been used in hundreds of films, television shows and commercials.

Tickets – $15 for the public and $10 for UNC students, staff, and faculty – are available online at http://memorialhall.unc.edu, by calling (919) 843-3333 or at the Memorial Hall Box Office on Cameron Avenue, open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. weekdays.

Carolina Performing Arts contacts: Harry Kaplowitz, (919) 843-3119, hkaplowitz@unc.edu
News Services contact: LJ Toler, (919) 962-8589

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