STG Presents FORTUNE'S BONES: The Manumission Requiem at The Paramount Theatre on Sunday, February 22, 2015. This is a free event. RSVP NOW: http://www.tfaforms.com/359266
STG is honored to present the Fortune’s Bones: The Manumission Requiem, a musical oratorio, featuring over 100 local voices, 8 soloists, an African drum ensemble, and 40+-piece orchestra. The requiem is inspired by a book authored by Dr. Marilyn Nelson entitled Fortune’s Bones: The Manumission Requiem, which has inspired a Seattle community-wide exploration of the story of Fortune, an enslaved African who served a doctor in post-Colonial Waterbury, Connecticut. After Fortune’s death in 1798, he was dissected by the doctor. His bones were boiled, stripped and preserved, studied, and later, displayed as an anatomical specimen at a local museum. Fortune remained unburied and without memorialization until 2013. Dr. Nelson’s book is an epic poem commemorating Fortune's life.
Dr. Ysaye Barnwell, formerly of Sweet Honey in the Rock, was commissioned by the Waterbury Symphony to write the cantata, which will be performed in Seattle.
The image above is of FORTUNE – as he may have looked in life. Relief sculpture by forensic artist Frank Bender based on Fortune’s skull. Collection of the Mattatuck Museum, Waterbury, Connecticut.
More info:
http://www.stgpresents.org/tickets/by-month/eventdetail/1705/-/fortune-s-bones-the-manumission-requiem#
