New York's Gotham Early Music Society (GEMS) will present The Play of Daniel, a 12th-century medieval music drama recounting the Old Testament story of Daniel, December 27-28 at Trinity Church.
Originally put together in Beauvais in northern France, the work is performed in the original Latin, with a new prologue in English to improve its accessibility to a wide audience.
In 1958, in an early expression of the Early Music movement, the conductor Noah Greenberg and the New York Pro Musica Antiqua revived this proto-opera, of which we have only the words and some melodic lines in obscure, millennium-old notation, and mounted a production. Lincoln Kirstein, a founder of the New York City Ballet, was the lead producer and set designer. Since then there have been numerous productions and recordings of the work.
To mark the 50th anniversary of the original revival, Concerts at the Cloisters commissioned countertenor Drew Minter to fashioned a new staged production in 2008. This realization was mounted again last December at Trinity Church's Twelfth Night Festival with such success that they've brought it back this season for four performances, at 3 and 6pm on December 27 and 28, 2014, directed by Minter and with string player and musicologist Mary Anne Ballard as Music Director.
James R. Oestreich in The New York Times called the music "inexpressibly beautiful…couched in drama that may well transport you to another time."
All you need to transport yourself to the biblical times of The Play of Daniel, at Trinity Church, Broadway and Wall Street, is the subway.
Visit the GEMS website for tickets.
