Romania

  It’s fun to have an excuse to travel, and this trip to Romania was sparked by a piece of music.   On April 20, 2023, the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra played a concert in honor of Israel’s 75 th birthday.   In anticipation of that concert, I was invited to chair a committee at the Jewish Federation to develop the musical program, working with Maestro Andreas Delfs and James Barry, the Vice President of Artistic Planning and Operations at the RPO.   James arranged the commission of a new work by Avner Dorman, an Israeli composer currently Professor on the faculty of the Sunderman Conservatory of Music at Gettysburg College, and about a year before the concert, Joyce and I agreed to fund the commission.   Joyce died in February 2023, and never got to hear it, but the piece is amazing, and she would have loved it.   The title, Tanyaderas , refers to “Sephardic Jewish women who led song and dance for life celebrations…” (see https://jwa.org/encycloped...