May Festival: Voices of the Earth Natural History is a collaboration between composer Michael Gordon and the Steiger Butte Singers. Written and commissioned to mark the centennial of the National Park System. In contrast, Julia Wolfe’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Anthracite Fields is a haunting and powerful oratorio that captures not only the sadness of lives lost in the anthracite coal fields at the turn of the 20th century, but a way of daily life now also lost. The Bang on a Can All-Stars lend their ferocity to this profound work alongside the May Festival Chorus.
Pulitzer Prize-winning composer and MacArthur Fellow Julia Wolfe will launch her residency as Carnegie Hall’s Richard and Barbara Debs Composer’s Chair for the 2021–2022 season on February 16 with the digital premiere of Oxygen.