New England Light Opera To Commemorate 100th Anniversary Of WW1

New England Light Opera (NELO), a musical theater company serving the greater Boston area, will present “The Great War at 100: Great Britain in Song and Verse” — a three-part concert series aimed at raising awareness of the political implications and resultant artistic outpourings of WWI — at three different locations in Lexington, Melrose, and Brookline, Massachusetts, over the course of two weekends in November. Planned to coincide with Armistice Day on November 11, the concerts will examine the themes of finding hope in despair, and transcending the horrors of war through art to promote peace and human betterment.

The first concert is scheduled for Sunday, November 9 at 2:00 p.m. at Hancock Church (1912 Massachusetts Avenue) in Lexington. The two remaining concerts will take place the following weekend — on Saturday, November 15 at 7:30 p.m. at Melrose Highlands Congregational Church (355 Franklin Street) in Melrose, and on Sunday, November 16 at 2:00 p.m. at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church (15 St. Paul Street) in Brookline.

“The 100th anniversary of WWI brought to mind Ivor Gurney’s powerful and rarely performed settings of A.E Housman’s A Shropshire Lad poems,” explains NELO Artistic Director, Mark Morgan, about the inspiration behind the concert series, which has received major underwriting support from the Harvard Musical Association and the Melrose Messina Fund for the Arts. “Gurney’s experience of the war strongly influences the work, and I began to wonder how the experience of the war influenced other British composers of the time.”

The program for the concerts will feature Morgan (performing as a baritone); Beverly Soll, piano; and Quartetto Ardente (Rebecca Hawkins and Randall Hiller, violin; Anne Black, viola; and Reed Drews, cello). Two major works will anchor the program: Ivor Gurney’s The Western Playland (and of sorrow) ― settings of A.E. Housman poems for baritone, piano, and string quartet — and Herbert Howells’s Piano Quartet in A Minor (which is dedicated to Gurney). Songs by Gerald Finzi, George Butterworth (who tragically died in World War I), Vaughan Williams, and American Samuel Barber will also be featured. Recitations of poetry by English poet and soldier Wilfred Owen, who died in battle one week before the WWI armistice was signed, will be interspersed with the music.

Thanks to major gifts from Elsa O. Sullivan and Albert O. Wilson Jr., admission for the Lexington concert on November 9 is free, with a $10 suggested donation at the door to support the music programs of Hancock Church. Tickets for the Melrose and Brookline concerts are $25 in advance, and $28 at the door. Proceeds from the Melrose performance will be donated to the Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Hall Restoration Fund in Melrose. Tickets can be purchased online at www.newenglandlightopera.org or by calling 866-811-4111.

Says Morgan: “We hope that these concerts will bring our communities together around the remembrance of the millions who died in this war, which has all but passed from modern consciousness in America.”