The Velvet Oratorio, an original opera/theater piece commemorating the 25th anniversary of The Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia, will be presented in the grand ballroom at the current home of the Czech Center and the Czech Consulate: The Bohemian National Hall.
The Velvet Oratorio is an evocative retelling of the Velvet Revolution through found text, choral music, and scenes inspired by Václav Havel's Vanek plays. The piece is organized as a series of alternating scenes and choruses, the chorus representing the crowds in Prague during the events spanning November 17 1989 to January 1, 1990. The text for the oratorio is based partly upon recently released U.S. State Department documents and corresponding Czechoslovakian / Soviet documents and interviews with journalists, diplomats, and ordinary people who were in the streets of Prague during the revolution. The Velvet Oratorio was original staged as a concert for New York Public Library for the Performing Arts’ festival, Performing Revolution in Central and Eastern Europe. This will be a full staging of the piece.
PERFORMANCE SCHEDULE;
Sat Nov 8 at 8pm, Sun Nov 9 at 5pm*
Fri Dec 12 at 8pm Sat Dec 13 at 8pm
Tue Jan 13 at 8pm Wed Jan 14 at 8pm
Show Finder
The Velvet Oratorio
First Preview: Oct 16, 2014
Opening Date: Nov 8, 2014
Closing Date: Jan 14, 2015
Running Time: 02:10
http://www.untitledtheater.com/previous-productions/the-velvet-oratorio.html?utm_source=October+2014
Playing @
Bohemian National Hall
321 East 73rd St, New York, NY 10021
Show Notes: 1 Intermission
Age Guidance: 16
Audience Advisory: *6:30 roundtable follows on Nov 9, the anniversary of the Berlin Wall—co-organized by the Goethe Institut
TDF Tickets Offers:
TDF Member tickets:
Not currently available for this show
Listed at 
Never
Full-price tickets:
$30.00 - $30.00
Reviews
-
“The scenes are played for irony, contradiction and some bawdy humor, which lends sympathy and humanism to the political subject and the paranoid atmosphere that defined the era ... Henry Akona’s cleverly dissonant, rhythmic music [is] deftly and tastefully orchestrated ... Like Bertolt Brecht's poetry, this work succeeds by framing the minuscule, everyday aspects of life in the context of oppression rather than insisting on sentimental patriotism or heroics ... a tasteful and thought-provoking reminder of the rapid change brought to Central Europe in those heady and confusing days.”
----Musical America -
“The scenes are played for irony, contradiction and some bawdy humor, which lends sympathy and humanism to the political subject and the paranoid atmosphere that defined the era ... Henry Akona’s cleverly dissonant, rhythmic music [is] deftly and tastefully orchestrated ... Like Bertolt Brecht's poetry, this work succeeds by framing the minuscule, everyday aspects of life in the context of oppression rather than insisting on sentimental patriotism or heroics ... a tasteful and thought-provoking reminder of the rapid change brought to Central Europe in those heady and confusing days.”
----Musical America -
“The scenes are played for irony, contradiction and some bawdy humor, which lends sympathy and humanism to the political subject and the paranoid atmosphere that defined the era ... Henry Akona’s cleverly dissonant, rhythmic music [is] deftly and tastefully orchestrated ... Like Bertolt Brecht's poetry, this work succeeds by framing the minuscule, everyday aspects of life in the context of oppression rather than insisting on sentimental patriotism or heroics ... a tasteful and thought-provoking reminder of the rapid change brought to Central Europe in those heady and confusing days.”
----Musical America -
“The scenes are played for irony, contradiction and some bawdy humor, which lends sympathy and humanism to the political subject and the paranoid atmosphere that defined the era ... Henry Akona’s cleverly dissonant, rhythmic music [is] deftly and tastefully orchestrated ... Like Bertolt Brecht's poetry, this work succeeds by framing the minuscule, everyday aspects of life in the context of oppression rather than insisting on sentimental patriotism or heroics ... a tasteful and thought-provoking reminder of the rapid change brought to Central Europe in those heady and confusing days.”
----Musical America
