The Chamber Music Society of Minnesota and actor Lou Bellamy will perform the world premiere of Steve Heitzeg’s While We Breathe, We Hope (Fanfare for Obama), a setting of a portion of Barack Obama’s election-night victory speech, at a February 15 concert at First Lutheran Church in Columbia Heights, Minnesota. The three-minute fanfare, setting the “This is the Moment” section of Obama’s victory speech in November, will be narrated by Lou Bellamy, founder and artistic director of St. Paul’s Penumbra Theater. The work was commissioned by Young-Nam Kim, the Chamber Music Society’s founder and artistic director, and is scored for violins, viola, cello, bass, piano, and a percussionist who will play Hawaiian ‘ili’ili stones. The program will also include Schubert’s “Trout” Quintet, the Adagio from Mozart’s Divertimento K. 240, and Heitzeg’s chamber work The Legend of Bluebonnet.
