To my readers in the New York area: my chorus is performing two concerts this weekend with the Astoria Symphony, one on Saturday night on the Upper West Side and another on Sunday afternoon in Long Island City (Queens). We’re singing mostly modern music, including the premiere of a piece by legendary Pulitzer-Prize-winning composer David Del Tredici called Queer Hosannas. We’re also performing Arnold Schoenberg’s Survivor From Warsaw, about a survivor of the Holocaust; the beautiful Brahms Alto Rhapsody; and a piece by former chorus member Stefan Weisman called David and Jonathan, about the biblical pair who some have presumed to have been lovers.

Saturday night at 8pm:

The Church of St. Paul & St. Andrew
263 West 86th Street
Manhattan

Sunday afternoon at 3pm:

LaGuardia Performing Arts Center
31-10 Thompson Ave.
Long Island City, Queens

Hope some of you can make it!

In a week and a half, HBO is airing a TV movie called Recount, about the 2000 Florida recount. Sounds interesting enough, although some people are criticizing the movie for portraying Gore team member (and former Secretary of State) Warren Christopher as too much of a wimp.

Even more intriguing: the writer of the screenplay happens to be Buffy the Vampire Slayer’s Danny Strong, a.k.a. Jonathan Levinson.