Current Season

"Decadent," "degenerate" and "downright dangerous!" (Sen. Joe McCarthy) are all labels used to describe the music, composers and performers featured on our annual Pride concert. Our program starts in Germany, where the Ambassadors follow the path of musical suppression from 1934 to its inevitable conclusion in World War 2. We'll explore the degenerate sounds of music by the Comedian Harmonists, Hans Eisler, Kurt Weill, Max Bruch and others, including the world premiere of a new arrangement of Unter dayne vayse shtern, written for TRANScend by composer Steve Cohen.

The Community Chorale cross the Atlantic, where a more diffuse -- but no less strange parallel -- of Nazi artistic repression occurred in America, during the 1950s/60s. This will showcase music by American-Jewish composers Aaron Copland and Leonard Bernstein, as well as folk music from musicians like Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, Harry Belafonte and more.