From Thapelo Masita:
In times of turmoil, we all choose to focus on that which is most essential in our lives. Our species has survived this way for thousands of years. Only once all danger has subsided do we try to heal. For me, the challenges the world faces today demand that we rethink this process. I believe that it is during this time, while we are in the fiery furnace, that we must transform our thinking so that we might come out better than we were before. The alternative is far too dangerous.
The music you will hear is a meditation on this very idea. A conversation between J.S. Bach, Negro spirituals, South African hymns, and Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson, this program is a metaphor for the kind of transformation we so deeply need. If all this music can work together to create a sound-world full of love, joy, peace, and belonging, then so can we. After all, we wrote it.
—Thapelo Masita (June 2020)
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In a moving reflection on hope, unity, and community, South African cellist Thapelo Masita weaves Bach's Solo Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major together with African American composer Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson's "Lamentations" and spirituals in a performance recently recorded in the empty galleries of The Met Cloisters.
A graduate of The Juilliard School, a faculty member of the Opportunity Music Project, founder and director of the Free State International Chamber Music Festival, and a founding member of the Uhuru String Quartet, Masita's artistic mission has been to champion community building and social change through music, to create training and education opportunities for youth, and to connect and empower women who have experienced domestic violence through artistic collaborations and performance.
This performance was filmed in Gallery 17, the Unicorn Tapestries Room at The Met Cloisters, on Monday, June 15, 2020.
Program
There Is a Balm in Gilead
arr. Thapelo Masita
Solo Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major, BWV 1007
Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750)
I. Prelude
II. Allemande
Ha Le Mpotsa Tshepo Yaka (When Asked Wherein My Hope Lies)
arr. Thapelo Masita
Solo Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major, BWV 1007
Johann Sebastian Bach
III. Courante
IV. Sarabande
Amazing Grace
arr. Thapelo Masita
Solo Cello Suite No. 1 in G Major, BWV 1007
Johann Sebastian Bach
V. Minuet I/II
VI. Gigue
Black/Folk Song Suite for Solo Cello ("Lamentations")
Coleridge-Taylor Perkinson (1932–2004)
IV. Perpetual Motion
MetLiveArts programming at The Met Cloisters is made possible by Art Mentor
Foundation Lucerne.
