So many composers throughout history, "you never even thought of as seeking political asylum," says soprano Olga Lisovska, a soloist with the Refugee Orchestra Project, which held a concert Sunday at Mechanics Hall, part of the Music Worcester series.
This collective of musicians perform together a few times a year in different cities, showcasing the music of composers who were persecuted and fled their homelands. Their own narratives are similar, living now in the U.S. or Europe because they had to leave, or chose to leave, where they were born.
Lisovska immigrated from Ukraine as a teenager and now lives in Massachusetts. More recently, members of her family came here from Ukraine as refugees.
Sunday, she performed Je Veux Vivre from Gounod's "Roméo et Juliette."
Gounod fled Paris in 1870 for London during the Franco-Prussian war.
"Such composers like Gounod, classical composers that we hear every single day in various opera houses. They faced that difficult time in their lives as refugees," Lisovska said.
Italy, Ukraine, Afghanistan
Sunday, musicians also performed an aria from "The Consul" by 20th century Italian composer Gian Carlo Menotti (Menotti may best be known for his one-act opera "Amahl and the Night Visitors").
During Refugee Orchestra Project rehearsals, founder and conductor Lydia Yankovskaya described Menotti's work on social media as piercing "in this moment."
The libretto tells the story of Europeans fleeing to the US, in the years around World War II — like Menotti himself.
———
"To this we’ve come:
that men withhold the world from men.
No ship nor shore for him who drowns at sea. No home nor grave for him who dies on land.
To this we’ve come:
that man be born a stranger upon God’s earth,
that he be chosen without a chance for choice,
that he be hunted without the hope of refuge.
To this we’ve come.
…
Have you ever seen the Consul?
Does he speak, does he breathe?
Have you spoken to him?
Papers! Papers! Papers!"
———
A work for strings, Maria's City, by Ukrainian cellist and composer Zoltan Almashi, was also in the program.
"It's about Mariupol," Lisovska explained, "the city was pretty much destroyed in the spring of 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine."
Sunday's show also brought the world premiere of "Humanity, from composer, pianist and visual artist Milad Yousifi who was born in Afghanistan in 1995, during the country's civil war. He now lives in the U.S.
The Syrian refugee crisis
The Refugee Orchestra Project first performed in 2016, as a way to unite refugee musicians during the Syrian refugee crisis.
A decade ago, conductor Yankovskaya wanted to bring awareness to the matter through music, Lisovska said.
"She had a vision, being a refugee herself [from Russia] and going through a difficult time as a child, moving to a new country and then also facing political strife here in the United States," Lisovska said.
When the musicians who make up the Refugee Orchestra Project perform with other ensembles their focus might be on perfection, Lisovska said, on having "the most beautiful vocal line and the longest, sparkling high notes."
But with the Refugee Orchestra Project, the performance transcends that. There is a human aspect added; composers' and musicians' personal stories.
For the audience and the musicians — the concert is about unity Lisovska said, adding "it's to show that we are all alike. We're all human beings here on this earth."
