WWU Symphony Orchestra and Concert Choir

The WWU Symphony and Concert Choir explore of one of the most impactful cultural touchstones in American history: Longfellow’s 1855 epic poem, “The Song of Hiawatha.” The British composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor's brilliant setting of “Hiawatha’s Wedding-Feast” was performed thousands of times in England and the US during his lifetime; for a time, it enjoyed an even greater popularity than Handel’s “Messiah.” 

While Coleridge-Taylor was at work on his cantata, the elderly Czech master Antonín Dvořák was in the US on assignment to help develop a uniquely American school of classical music. He had also been deeply affected by “Hiawatha,” and began work on his own musical setting, which later evolved into his 9th Symphony, “From the New World.” Dvořák was also captivated by spirituals he learned from Harry T. Burleigh, fragments of which also permeate the work. 

Works by Indigenous composers lead off the concert: “Chokfi’" by Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate and Andrew Balfour’s “Omaa Biindig."