Meira Warshauer's 'Ocean Calling Trilogy' To Be Featured In February And March Lectures And Performances

Composer Meira Warshauer's Ocean Calling Trilogy for two pianos will be featured in a series of February and March 2022 lectures and performances.

February 25 @ 1 PM - Meira will present a live and streamed lecture, For the Love of Earth: Ocean Calling Trilogy and the Fragility of Nature at the University of South Carolina School of Music, 813 Assembly St., room 232 in Columbia, South Carolina. This will be part of the University's Luise E. Peake Music and Culture Colloquium.

The lecture will be presented along with What Goes Around Comes Around, an art installation by Bonnie Louise Monteleone, Executive Director of Plastic Ocean Project, Inc., on exhibition in the School of Music library, February 21-28.

February 28 @ 7:30 PM - The World Premiere of Warshauer's complete Ocean Calling series of works for two pianos will be presented live and streamed at Freeman Recital Hall of the U. of S.C. School of Music, 813 Assembly St., in Columbia.

Performers will be U. of S.C. faculty member Phillip Bush and guest artist Elizabeth Loparits, presenting Ocean Calling I: Waves and Currents, Ocean Calling II: From the Depths and Ocean Calling III: The Giant Blue.

The live stream will be available at https://www.youtube.com/c/TheUofSCSchoolofMusic.

March 2 @ 7:30 PM - The North Carolina premiere of the complete Ocean Calling will be presented by Mr. Bush and Ms. Loparits live and streamed at Tew Recital Hall, School of Music of the University of North Carolina, Greensboro, 100 McIver St., in Greensboro, N.C.

This will also be presented alongside What Goes Around Comes Around, an art installation by Bonnie Louise Monteleone, on exhibition in the Recital Hall Atrium, March 1-3.

Also on March 2, Meira will present her lecture, For the Love of Earth: Ocean Calling Trilogy and the Fragility of Nature at 5 PM in the School of Music, room 217.

The trilogy will be recorded by the two pianists on March 6-9 at Freeman Recital Hall of the U. of S.C. School of Music for release by Parma/Navona, with Brad Michel, producer and Jeff Francis, recording engineer.

As Meira writes, "Nature has long been an inspiration for composers, and indeed for all artists. What's different now, and my drive for composing Symphony Living Breathing Earth, Ocean Calling, Ahavah (Love) and other related works, is that we can no longer take this living planet for granted."

She also writes, "This series of compositions for two pianos is dedicated to the ocean. Called our "life-support" system, the ocean covers 72% of the planet's surface and provides half the oxygen we breathe and many other resources, while regulating our climate with currents traversing thousands of miles. As I learn of large-scale contaminations, over-fishing, acidification, death of coral reefs and rising temperatures linked to the urgent Climate Crisis, I fear we take the ocean's gifts for granted, unaware that our survival is linked to the ocean's health. I hope the Ocean Calling series will help us to renew our connection with this vital life source and its vast, mysterious realms, and that we will hear the call from the sea that we are part of one interconnected whole."

Meira Warshauer has devoted much of her creative output to Jewish themes and their universal message and her work also reflects a love and concern for the earth. Her latest CDs, Coro del Mundo and Chevere, featuring her choral music, were both recorded in Cuba, and have been released on the Ansonica label. Navona previously released Living Breathing Earth, a CD (NV5842) featuring her American Prize-winning Symphony No.1: Living Breathing Earth and Tekeeyah (a call), concerto for shofar, trombone and orchestra with soloist Haim Avitsur. Albany Records had released her acclaimed Streams in the Desert disk of Torah-based choral/orchestral works. Elijah's Violin, her family opera based on a Jewish fairy tale, was presented in a semi-staged production in San Francisco in 2019.

Warshauer's music is published by Hildegard, Lauren Keiser Music, World Music Press and Kol Meira Publications. Visit her at https://meirawarshauer.com/.

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