The Crossing to Perform David Lang's 'poor hymnal' in New York and Philadelphia This December

Three-time GRAMMY Award-winning professional chamber choir The Crossing, led by conductor Donald Nally and dedicated to new music, will present "The Crossing @ Christmas 2024," with three December performances David Lang's poor hymnal, one of those rare pieces that seamlessly and quickly moves from its first performance to icon.

Premiered in December 2023 in Philadelphia, in what critic David Patrick Stearns called, "music that doesn't pull punches but leads listeners inward to the humanitarian core that's there but not always accessed," the concert-length work immediately entered The Crossing's canon.

A winner of the Pulitzer, GRAMMY, Bessie, and Obie Awards, and an Academy Award nominee, the New York-based Lang is one of America's most highly esteemed and in-demand composers. A co-founder of the tremendously influential Bang on a Can collective, Lang's work has been performed at concert halls and theaters around the world, including numerous times at Lincoln Center. In poor hymnal, Lang wonders "if the hymns of a community that did not want to forget our responsibilities to each other, and that wanted to make our responsibilities to each other the central tenet of our coming together, might be different from the hymns that we are singing now." Like his Pulitzer-winning work, the little match girl passion, poor hymnal tries to get to the core of what a religious experience can be.

Recognized as "America's most astonishing choir" (The New York Times), The Crossing makes its Alice Tully Hall debut at Lincoln Center with the New York premiere of poor hymnal on Saturday, December 21, at 7:30 p.m., as part of the Lincoln Center Presents series and "The Crossing @ Christmas 2024."

Two Philadelphia performances of poor hymnal take place on Friday, December 20 at 7:00 p.m. at Saint Mark's Church, 1625 Locust Street in Philadelphia, and Sunday, December 22 at 5:00 p.m. at Presbyterian Church of Chestnut Hill, 885 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia.

In anticipation of the December performances, The Crossing's new recording of poor hymnal will be released on Cantaloupe Records on Friday, December 13. The work was recorded with the composer present at the time of its premiere last December at Articulate Studios in Bloomsbury, New Jersey. poor hymnal was co-commissioned for The Crossing and Donald Nally by Elizabeth and Justus Schlichting, Jill and Loren Bough, and Peggy and Mark Curchack. The premiere performance and recording of poor hymnal were made possible through the generous support of Carol Westfall.

The poor hymnal tour continues in February 2025, with performances in Princeton University's Richardson Auditorium on Tuesday, February 4 at 7:30 p.m., presented by McCarter Theatre; the University of Iowa's Voxman Music Building in Iowa City on Thursday, February 13 at 7:30 p.m., as part of a residency with David Lang; Drake University's Sheslow Auditorium in Des Moines, Iowa, on Friday, February 14 at 7:30 p.m.; and First Plymouth Congregational Church in Lincoln, Nebraska, on Sunday, February 16 at 4:00 p.m., presented by Abendmusik.

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