In 2001, the Boston Symphony Orchestra gave the U.S. premiere of Argentine composer Osvaldo Golijov's La Pasión Según San Marcos, a work that tells the story of the Passion through a Latin American lens. The BSO will present the work again on January 9, 10 and 11 at Symphony Hall under the direction of Robert Spano, who also conducted the premiere.
Golijov's retelling of The Passion According to St. Mark sets the story of Christ's betrayal, death and resurrection amidst the streets of Latin America. He uses strikingly unusual styles of music to tell the familiar Passion story: samba, salsa, flamenco and tango. La Pasión integrates multiple genres and cultural traditions including dance, folk music, batá drumming and capoeira martial arts.
The resulting work received great acclaim at its U.S. and world premieres. As James Inverne wrote in a recent Classicalite story about Golijov, "He burst into music fans' view with a sensational contribution to the Bach 2000 project in Stuttgart, La Pasión Según San Marcos. It remains an amazing piece of work and set the stage for several more pieces that burst with ideas and are suffused in Golijov's many influences--musical theater, klezmer, Arabic music, film soundtracks."
The Boston Globe hailed La Pasión as "a work of genius" saying, "the work will stand as the first indisputably great composition of the 21st century."
The Boston Symphony's upcoming performances of the work will feature soprano Jessica Rivera, vocalist Biella da Costa, Afro-Cuban singer and dancer Reynaldo González-Fernandez and Deraldo Ferreira performing capoeira dance. They will be joined by members of the Schola Cantorum de Venezuela and the Orquesta La Pasión (an ensemble created expressly for performances of this work).
More information about this program is available at bso.org.
Since Golijov wrote La Pasión, his career as a composer has had its ups and downs. He is currently working on an opera, to be premiered by the Metropolitan Opera during the 2018-19 season. However, he has also been accused of plagiarism by fellow composer Michael Ward-Bergeman, with whom Golijov collaborated on a film score.
Golijov has maintained that Ward-Bergeman was perfectly aware that he used some of his music as source material for the overture Sidereus. Daniel J. Wakin, himself, has written more about this controversy in a New York Times article.
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