Sunday, June 3, 2007, 7 p.m., and Thursday, June 7, 2007, 8 p.m., at Walt Disney Concert Hall

Three-way Collaboration Unites Master Musicians, Composers and the Chorale, Bridging Western and Persian Classical Music Traditions

Program Also Includes Magnificat and Nunc dimittis by James MacMillan and Arvo Pärt’s Te Deum

The Los Angeles Master Chorale concludes its 43rd season by launching LA is the World, a groundbreaking multi-year initiative in which new choral works are created through a three-way collaboration among master musicians, composers and the Chorale. The world premiere of the first of these unique collaborations, Sang (Farsi for “stone”), crafted by composer Eve Beglarian in partnership with acclaimed Iranian-American musicians Manoochehr Sadeghi and Pejman Hadadi, and the Chorale, will be presented on Sunday, June 3, 2007, 7 p.m., and Thursday, June 7, 2007, 8 p.m. Sadeghi, a master of the Persian santur (a 72-string hammer dulcimer), and Hadadi, a virtuoso Iranian tombak (a chalice shaped drum) and daf player (frame drum), are the featured soloists, bridging Western and Persian classical music traditions. Music Director Grant Gershon also conducts Arvo Pärt’s triple chorus Te Deum and Magnifcat and Nunc dimittis by James MacMillan, enhanced by the sonic richness of organist David Goode.

“Listen Up!”, a pre-concert talk in BP Hall hosted by KUSC’s Alan Chapman and featuring Gershon and Beglarian, will be held one hour prior to each performance. The concert is funded in part by grants from The James Irvine Foundation, Creative Capital’s Multi-Arts Production Fund, The Durfee Foundation and The Dan Murphy Foundation, and by a generous gift from Jon and Lillian Lovelace.

“Of all the meaningful work that the Master Chorale does, LA is the World is the project that is closest to my heart right now,” says Gershon. “It enables our singers to explore and our audience to experience some of the vital and sophisticated traditions that make our city alive. The works that are created in these kind of collaborations will help ensure that choral music remains a living, evolving and vibrant art form.”

Beglarian, who currently resides in New York, comes to the project with a unique perspective, noting, “I grew up in Los Angeles, a wonderfully complex city of people from somewhere else.”

Beglarian has constructed the piece around the images of stones found in darkness that, when held to the light, turn out to be jewels. The text comes from Shahnameh, by renowned Persian poet Ferdowsi, which will be sung in Farsi. Beglarian has also chosen text from the Old Testament that will be sung in Hebrew and Greek. Elements of the Persian Radif are used throughout. The Radif is a collection of musical material that is the basis for all Persian music, passed generation to generation by a master musician to his students. It consists of twelve dastgahs, or tonal systems, each with its own repertory of melodies, upon which artists improvise. Much of the music has no specific meter, or beat, but follows a rhythm like that of speech and is likely related to the rhythms of Persian poetry. It is a musical tradition that is inherently improvisational and deeply personal. In the beginning of Beglarian’s work, the Radif are hidden – embedded within the piece like the stones about which the chorus is singing. It is only as these stones are brought into the light – roughly transliterated as “rawsti” – and the truth revealed that the music evolves into a full-blown improvisation that is firmly rooted in the traditional melodies of the Radif. The beauty and richness of the Persian musical tradition, as reflected through the artistry of the master musicians, becomes the metaphorical jewel of the piece.

Tickets to the Los Angeles Master Chorale’s concert range from $19 to $109. Student Rush seats are $10 and are available at the box office two hours before the performance. For tickets and information, please call (800) 787-5262 (outside California call 213-972-7282), log on to www.lamc.org or visit the box office at the Walt Disney Concert Hall, Tuesday through Sunday from noon to 6 p.m., located at 111 South Grand Avenue at First Street in downtown Los Angeles.

EVE BEGLARIAN is an extraordinarily accomplished composer and performer whose music has been described as “an eclectic and wide-open series of enticements” by the Los Angeles Times. Her chamber and orchestral music has been commissioned and performed by the Bang on a Can All-Stars, the California EAR Unit, the Paul Dresher Ensemble and others, and she has worked extensively with directors and choreographers such as Lee Bruer, Chen Shi-Zheng, Robert La Fosse, and Susan Marshall.

MANOOCHEHR SADEGHI began to study classical Persian santur (a 72-string hammer dulcimer) in Tehran when he was seven years old under the master Ustad Abol Hassan Saba. He has enjoyed a distinguished career as a master performer and teacher both in Iran and the United States, and has been recorded on U.S. record labels and for broadcast on Iranian television and radio. In 2003, Sadeghi was named a National Heritage Fellow of the National Endowment for the Arts.

PEJMAN HADADI is a virtuoso Iranian tombak and daf (frame drum) player who began playing tombak at the age of ten under masters Asadollah Hejazi and Bahman Rajabi. He has spent his professional career as a performing and recording artist with ensembles of Persian classical music as well as Indian, Turkish and American.

DAVID GOODE is Organist and Head of Keyboard at Eton College, where he presides over a unique collection of historic instruments and teaches some of the UK's most talented young organists. He combines this with a concert career that takes him to all parts of the world.

The Grammy-nominated LOS ANGELES MASTER CHORALE, a resident company of the Music Center, has been cited as a national leader for its innovative and dynamic programming. Recognized as one of the city’s cultural treasures and one of the world’s premier choruses, the Chorale, a founding resident company of the Music Center, has played a leading role in the ongoing resurgence of interest in choral music. Los Angeles Times proclaims the Los Angeles Master Chorale “has become the most exciting chorus in the country under Grant Gershon.”

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