Sir Michael Tippett (1905-1998) wrote his classical oratorio, A Child of Our Time, shortly after the outbreak of World War II in September 1939. It expresses deep compassion for those oppressed by the Great Depression and the Nazi regime.
The chorus and four soloists sing of the fears and sorrows of the preceding decade typified by the tragic life of Herschel Grynszpan, a German Jewish teenager whose assassination of a Nazi official triggered the infamous Kristallnacht. Sir Michael radically substituted African-American spirituals, like Steal Away and Nobody Knows the Trouble, for chorales of his own.
The Sam Wu composition the wind blows full of sand was commissioned after Mr. Wu won the BCCO’s composer competition in 2019. Sam Wu renders Ezra Pound’s 1915 poem “Lament from the Frontier Guard”. His haunting music sits at the boundaries of different cultures, creating dialogue between different traditions of musicality with their unique musical instruments.