The Choral Society of Pensacola presents the regional premiere of Jocelyn Hagen’s The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, a symphony for chorus, orchestra, and video using cutting-edge syncing technology. The event is set for Saturday, March 4, 2023, at 7:30 pm in the University of West Florida Center for Fine and Performing Arts (11000 University Parkway, Building 82, Pensacola, FL 32514).
Commissioned for the 500th anniversary of da Vinci’s death by a consortium of ensembles from across the United States, the work has received more than two dozen performances since its premiere in 2019. Through a fusion of words, music, and images, it brilliantly conveys the genius of a “painter, draftsman, sculptor, architect, and engineer whose skill and intelligence, perhaps more than that of any other figure, epitomized the Renaissance humanist ideal…His notebooks reveal a spirit of scientific inquiry and a mechanical inventiveness that were centuries ahead of their time.” (Britannica.com).
Inspired by the possibilities of Muséik, revolutionary digital sync software developed by Ion Concert Media, Hagen designed the work “so that the music serves as the foundation for the film instead of it functioning as purely a supporting musical soundtrack.” The projections blend text and drawings from the notebooks with animation, as well as still and motion picture photography, and Muséik grants a computer operator control over the images, allowing nuanced, expressive response to the conductor, behaving like a musical instrument.
In addition to The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci, the program includes a work by another American woman, Alice Parker. Her Three Seas, a trio of settings of poems by Emily Dickinson, will be performed by the Society’s Treble Ensemble, conducted by Isabelle Peterson. Tickets are available online through the Society’s website (www.choralsocietyofpensacola.org) and Facebook page, and at Eventbrite.com. Prices are $20 (adult), $18 (senior/military), $10 (student), $5 (child under 12), and $15 (groups of 10 or more). Tickets will also be available at the door for $5 more.
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