Fri 6/26 @ 7:30PM

Composer/arranger/conductor Craig Hella Johnson founded nonprofit performing arts/music education nonprofit and choir Conspirare in 1991, dedicated to music to “change lives, inspire peace, and foster belonging.” His “fusion oratorio,” Considering Matthew Shepherd, combines musical styles and texts by poets such as Rumi, Hildegard of Bingen, Michael Dennis Browne and Lesléa Newman as well as excerpts from Shepherd’s journals, and interviews and writing from his parents, newspaper reports of his death in 1998, murdered for being gay.

The piece was premiered by Conspirare in 2016, and has been performed by choirs all over the world. This weekend it will be performed at Severance Music Center by participants of the weeklong intensive, the Cleveland Orchestra Summer Choral Institute, conducted by Lisa Wong, Director of Choruses for the Cleveland Orchestra, and featuring members of the Cleveland Orchestra, along with bass-baritone Dashon Burton.

Go here for tickets.