The Oklahoma City Philharmonic in performance with Music Director Alexander Mickelthwate.
“The April 19th, 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City stands as the most destructive, most deadly, and most indelibly etched domestic terror attack in American history, and tributes of all kinds have long been common,” writes Brett Fieldcamp in Friday’s (4/21) Oklahoma City Free Press. “But art–and perhaps music in particular–has a unique way of cutting to the deepest emotional core and examining not only the never-ending hurt, but also the ineffable … perspective of time…. In reverence of the 168 lives lost that day … the OKC Philharmonic, led by Maestro Alexander Mickelthwate, releases a new album of musical tributes, both to the memory of the victims and to the unceasing passage of time. Featuring three stunning, long-form works by composer Jonathon Leshnoff, the collection is capped by the newly commissioned ‘Of Thee I Sing,’ created as a direct remembrance and requiem for that devastating day…. The premiere recording by the OKC Philharmonic and Canterbury Voices under the conduction of Mickelthwate appears on a new album of interpretations of Leshnoff’s recent works … his Violin Concerto No. 2 … and ‘Elegy,’ composed last year for … Israel’s national Holocaust Remembrance Day.”
