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«The Composer and The Nightingale »

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The musical drama chronicles, with facts, the secret romance of Chopin and Jenny Lind, the.Swedish Nightingale.

"The Composer and The Nightingale" - a musical drama or a dramatic reading with music - is set in six acts for narrator, piano, soprano and mezzo soprano (or two sopranos).  The music provides flexibility for a performance of 60-75 minutes.  Audience 50-500.

Brussels premiere of "The Composer and The Nightingale" for a VIP audience on 11 October 2003: Biljana Staffansson (soprano), Ljiljana Jovanovic (soprano), and Daniel Blumenthal (piano) in Act 4, "Hope" (74 Rue de Chaillot).The music:  Bellini, Chopin and Meyerbeer, two of Jenny Lind's Scandinavian signature-songs and a mazurka arrangement by Pauline Viardot.  Jenny Lind sang a love song to Chopin's Mazurka, op. 24/3 (act 6) twice for Queen Victoria in 1855-1856.
 

Each act unfolds by the narrator citing some of Chopin's letters to family and friends.  The letters mirror to a surprising degree quotes taken from Hans.Christian Andersen's The Nightingale, the fairytale he wrote as a tribute to Jenny Lind in 1843.
Playwrights:  Cecilia and Jens Jorgensen (Icons of Europe), based on their Chopin biography, Jenny Lind's 'Method' and new research.  They hold all rights on productions resulting from their research.

Lithograph of Jenny Lind (1820-1887) performing one of her Scandinavian signature-songs, "The Norwegian Echo Song" (Act. 2, "Magnolia" of "The Composer and The Nightingale").The seamlessness of great European culture
After the Warsaw premiere, H.E. Mr Charles Crawford, British Ambassador to Poland, wrote to the Foreign Office in London about the performance:  "The musical drama ingeniously brought together historical and musical elements from all over Europe ... to bring outthe seamlessness of great European culture."

The title of the musical drama could be tailor-made to the context and purpose of a new premiere, e.g. emphasis on Paris, Europe, Canada, or on a national event or  TB advocacy.

Available in book form
The.Composer and The Nightingale" is.now available as a print-on-demand hardcover book with the complete script, music repertoire, rare scores, colour images and more. 

It is enjoyable to study the book.  It could also be used as a manual for a production with music by Chopin, Bellini, Liszt and Meyerbeer as well as with arrangements by Jenny Lind and Pauline Viardot.

>> Buy the new book at Amazon.co.uk | Other Chopin books
>> Would you like the musical drama staged for your audience?

Book income donated to the Icons of Europe TB Fund for World TB Day advocacy.

PREMIERES
New York 2008
 Toronto 2005
 Warsaw 2004
 Brussels 2003


Royal Ontario Museum, 2005

The musical drama has celebrated the new Europe and marked World TB Day (Chopin died apparently of tuberculosis).
Also suitable for other themes.


FOUR SOURCES
FOR THE DRAMA

The biography "CHOPIN and The Swedish Nightingale" (Icons of Europe, 2003) by Cecilia and Jens Jorgensen, playwrights of the musical drama "The Composer and The Nightingale".
Biography of Chopin
HCA's The Nightingale
Subsequent research


 Jenny Lind (1820-1887) and her German husband Otto Goldschmidt (1829-1907).
Jenny Lind's 'Method',
booklet edited by her German widower Otto Goldschmidt
(rare 1st edition, 1894)

In 2003-2008, the musical drama was  entitled
"Chopin and The Nightingale"
.
Renaissance of the original repertoire of Jenny Lind and Pauline Viardot:  Bellini, Meyerbeer, Chopin
 Patronage provided earlier by Ambassadors of Britain, Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, Poland and Sweden,