Yes is a Worldhttp://www.yesisaworld.org
YES IS A WORLD is a Chicago-based nonprofit organization working to
promote peace and social change through musical diversity and the
collaboration of young artists. Since their inception in 2002, Yes is
a World has produced several integrated musical performances. These
include KISS THE SPEAKER WIRE (2003), an exploration of protest music
from America and South Africa; THE QUIETING (2004), with songs set to texts of Brian Eno's charismatic deck of cards "Oblique Strategies;" A NEW WAKE
(2005), a benefit fundraiser at New York's Riverside Church for
victims of the Southeast Asian Tsunami with music of Charles Ives,
Michael Gordon, Nellie McKay, Dinuk Wijeratne and songs of mourning
from around the world. Other projects have included an open-mic
political awareness campaign and a production of Tony Kushner's
one-act play ONLY WE WHO GUARD THE MYSTERY SHALL BE UNHAPPY. Upcoming
productions will include a full production of Ted Hearne's KATRINA
BALLADS at Charleston's 2007 Piccolo Spoleto Festival, and the newest
collection of sounds from South Africa's HIV-AIDS crisis in an
integrated multimedia performance in Autumn 2007.
TED HEARNE is an active composer, conductor, and performer of new
music. He is Artistic Director of Chicago's Yes is a World, a
nonprofit organization working to promote peace and social change
through musical diversity and the collaboration of young artists. Ted
was a composition fellow at the Bang on a Can Summer Institute in
2004, and he served as adjunct faculty at Manhattan School of Music
from 2004-2006. He was the music director for the premiere of David
Lang's opera Anatomy Theatre, as well as for an October 2006
production of The
Carbon Copy Building, the Obie-winning opera co-composed by Michael
Gordon, David Lang, and Julia Wolfe. Ted has worked with ICE, Ridge
Theatre, TACTUS, Peter Schreier and Jai Uttal, among others. He is the
resident conductor of Red Light New Music and sings regularly with the
Choir of St. Mary the Virgin (New York). He has studied composition
with Nils Vigeland, Robert Lombardo and Julia Wolfe and is currently
working with Aaron Jay Kernis as a student at the Yale School of
Music.
MOLLIE STONE (Director of South African music) is the Associate
Conductor of the Chicago Children's Choir, having received her
bachelor's degree from Amherst College in '01 and her master's degree
in conducting from Westminster Choir College in '04. She served as the
graduate associate for the Amherst College music department in 2001,
during which she received a grant from the Henry J. Kaiser Family
Foundation to create a DVD, "Vela Vela", on black South African choral
music. Last year, Ms. Stone received another generous grant from
Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation that enabled her to return to South
Africa with Yes is a World this past summer to study how South
Africans are using choral music in the struggle against HIV. Mollie
does workshops on black South African choral music across the country,
and currently serves as the associate conductor for Yes Is A World.
ALLISON SEMMES enjoys singing classical, jazz, R&B, pop, gospel, and any repertoire in between. Allison is a recent graduate at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana, receiving her bachelors in classical voice performance. Allison has been a member of The University of Illinois, Black Chorus, Women's Glee Club, and University Concert Choir, serves as the music coordinator for the African American Academy for the Arts under the University's African American Cultural Program, as well as the founding president and musical director of SoulEssence Acappella, the first all minority women's a cappella ensemble on campus. SoulEssence has performed all over the campus, community, and other college campuses as well. As well as directing an a cappella group, she has also performed in a wide variety of music performances. She has performed in operas such as Sweeney Todd, Suor Angelica, Candide, and L'incoronazione di Poppea. She also serves as a jazz vocalist of a well-known jazz trio in Champaign-Urbana, Panache, and as a soloist in the University Black Chorus, singing gospel, spirituals, and R&B songs. Allison also put on George Gershwin cabaret-style performances all over the campus community, including the President's House and Krannert Center for the Performing Arts, and was sent to Naples Florida to perform for the University Foundation. Allison is a founding member of Yes is a WorldÕs Siyakhumbala and vocal sextet The Current.
ISAIAH ROBINSON is the 5th of 8 children. Both of his parents are veteran recording artists as well as songwriters. Isaiah has been singing all his life and playing the piano since the age of four. He joined the Chicago Children's Choir in 1992, and throughout his childhood has done voice-over and acting work. He won a gold medal for the 2001 National NAACP ACT-SO Competition for contemporary vocal and a silver medal in the classical division. He is currently the resident musical director for the Dunes Summer Theater Lab in Michiana Shores, Indiana He is a founding member of Yes is a World, with whom he performed Benjamin Britten's Serenade for tenor, horn, and string orchestra in August 2004 under the direction of Ted Hearne. "Walking in space, we find the purpose of peace."
Critically acclaimed for her "plush, luxurious voice" and "unfailing sensitivity," mezzo-soprano ABIGAIL FISCHER is a versatile singer with repertoire ranging from the Medieval period to premieres of contemporary works. As an early music musician, she has worked with musicians such as Paul O'Dette, Ellen Hargis, Fred Renz, and Andrew Parrott with New York Collegium. As a contemporary musician, she has worked under conductors such as Brad Lubman, Gil Rose, and Daniel Reusse, and performed works by Berio, Babbitt, Reich, Rands, Zorn, Xenakis, and the Bang on a Can artists. On the stage, she has performed as Oberon in Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream, Cherubino in Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro, Mrs. Lovett in Sondheim's Sweeney Todd, Mother Marie in Poulenc's Dialogue of the Carmelites, Dido in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas, and will perform as Ma Moss in Bronx Opera's January production of Copland's The Tender Land. Ms. Fischer solos regularly in oratorio work, performing works such as Mozart's Requiem, Beethoven's Missa Solemnis, Handel's Messiah, and Bach's Magnificat. Trained as a cellist, she continues to pursue chamber music as a vocalist. A graduate of Vassar College and the Eastman School of Music, Ms. Fischer studied with teachers Drew Minter, Mary Ann Hart, Carol Webber, and Susanne Mentzer. She has attended Lucca Opera Festival, Ferrandou Singing School, Opera North, Madison Early Music Festival, Aspen Music Festival, the Tanglewood Music Festival, and the Lucerne Festival Academy.
A native of Des Moines, Iowa, ANTHONY TURNER is enjoying success in a variety of musical venues: from opera to Broadway, from orchestral concerts to solo recitals. He has appeared as guest soloist with Boston Musica Viva in the "Creation" by Louis Gruenberg, the Serenade recital series (Staten Island, NY) and at the Kennedy Center in the Dance Theatre of Harlem production St. Louis Woman. Mr. Turner has made numerous appearances with the Reno Choral Society of Kansas as bass soloist in Handel's "Messiah," as well as, performed with the Kansas Boys and Girls Choir. As a recitalist, he has appeared in Washington, D.C.; Lexington, KY; Indianapolis, IN; Cincinnati, Cleveland and Dayton, OH. His orchestral appearances include: the Orchestra of St. Luke's, NYC; the Evansville Philharmonic Orchestra, IN; the Lincoln Chamber Orchestra and the Omaha Symphony, NE; the Cincinnati Symphony and the Phoenix Symphony.
Mr. Turner's opera/musical theater roles include: Harry Easter in Street Scene; William Henry in Harriet Tubman; Alfio in Cavalleria Rusticana; Dappertutto in Les Contes d'Hoffmann; Schaunard in La Boheme; and Dr. Falke in Die Fledermaus. He has worked with the conductors Jesus Lopez-Cobos, David Stern, Henry Janiec, Robert Moody, Bruce Hangen, Lt. Col. Craig Jessop, Yaakov Bergman and Richard Pittman.
Mr. Turner received his degree in vocal performance from Simpson College, and a Master's degree in vocal performance from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. He is an exponent of the classical repertoire of music by black and minority composers, a literature which is consistently included in his concert repertoire.
Mr. Turner has toured the United States and Europe with performance artist Laurie Anderson in "Songs and Stories from Moby Dick." He has been a featured guest on the PBS special GREAT PERFORMANCES series "Aida's Brothers and Sisters: Black Voices in Opera." He was a recitalist for the Inaugural Concert at the American Classical Music Hall of Fame in Cincinnati, celebrating the Centennial of the National Federation of Music Clubs. Mr. Turner was featured soloist with Jessye Norman in a benefit concert for the Healing of AIDS, under the direction of George C. Wolfe, presented at the Riverside Church in New York City under the auspices of The Balm in Gilead, Inc. He has recorded the songs of Finnish composer, Heikki Sarmanto.
Mr. Turner is a member of Actors' Equity Association, the American Guild of Musical Artists, Phi Mu Alpha, Phi Beta Sigma and a life member of the National Federation of Music Clubs.
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