| BRUSSELS, April 6. - The Glenn Gould School of the
Royal Conservatory of Music will stage the Canadian premiere of "Chopin and The
Nightingale" for a public audience at the Royal Ontario Museum on 24 April.
H.E. Mr David Reddaway CMG MBE, British High Commissioner to Canada has lent his patronage
to this premiere. "Chopin and The Nightingale" is a
musical dramatization of the newly discovered romance between Polish composer Fryderyk
Chopin and Swedish soprano Jenny Lind - written for piano, two sopranos and
narrator. Chopin died of tuberculosis (TB) in 1849, only 39 years old.
To promote World TB Day 2005 in Toronto through "great
culture", the event is the result of a transatlantic joint venture, designed
with the support of the TB Program at Toronto Public Health, and endorsed by the Consulate
General of the Republic of Poland in Toronto, the Fryderyk Chopin Institute in Warsaw, the
Embassy of Canada in Brussels, and Stop TB Canada.
Quotes from Chopin's letters and Hans Christian Andersen's "The
Nightingale" (he wrote it in 1843 as a tribute to Jenny Lind) set the stage for each
act of the musical drama of which the Brussels-based association Icons of Europe is
playwright, pro bono co-producer, and sponsor.
The "Chopin masterpieces and Nightingale songs" concert at the
Royal Ontario Museum on 4 March 2005 gave a capacity audience of 600 people a taste of the
24 April premiere, as well as an insight into the threat that TB poses today. A
curable disease, TB kills over two million people each year in low- and high-income
countries. Drug resistance, a TB/HIV interface, migrants and stigma have created a
dangerous and complex situation.
Says Jens A. Jorgensen, president of Icons of Europe: "Great
culture provides a transatlantic bridge and unites institutions in the fight against
TB".
For further information, please contact Cecilia Jorgensen,
general manager of Icons of Europe, Brussels:
tel. +32 2 633 3840, fax +32 2 633 4445, icons@europe.com
.
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