By Robert Croan
To commemorate this year’s Pride Month and the 10th anniversary of the infamous Pulse massacre in Orlando, the Gay Men’s Chorus of South Florida commissioned Amor Eterno: A Requiem for Pulse from Saunder Choi, a 38-year-old Philippine-born composer currently based in Los Angeles.
It’s an ample 45-minute opus, fitting the enormity of the tragic event, and the premiere June 19 in Broward Center’s Au-Rene Theater involved not only GMCSF under its artistic director Gabe Salazar, but the Symphony of the Americas and singers from the Orlando Gay Chorus, the Miami Gay Chorus and the Gay Men’s Chorus of Tampa Bay. In addition to two professional soloists, 124 singers were listed in the printed program.
Amor Eterno is not a liturgical Catholic Requiem. In the mold of Johanne Brahms’s iconic German Requiem, it’s a collection of poems of consolation for the mourners, in the language of the people. The shooting took place when the gay bar was having Latin Night, and most of the victims were Hispanic. The words of Amor Eterno alternate between English and Spanish.
GMCSF called this concert Invincible — taken from the Kelly Clarkson song composed a year before the shooting, and it took on additional meaning now, as state and federal governments are erasing and censoring minorities’ history and awareness. The evening opened with brief statements from two Pulse survivors, who gave harrowing first-hand descriptions of the massacre and the pain and exploitation they suffered afterwards — including double-digit surgeries and the use of their stories without permission or compensation. Then, before the music began, there was a solemn procession in which chorus members brought out portraits of each of the 49 persons who were killed.
The opening lines of Choi’s Requiem, “How beautiful is our mourning,” (by Leo Herrera) echo Brahms’s quote from the Book of Matthew, “Blessed are those that mourn,” but what follows has an originality and immediacy that communicated cogently through the enthusiastic singing of the combined choirs, deftly led by Salazar — returning after an absence due to back surgery. With a consort of this size, it’s inevitable that not all the words will come through, but the projection of the texts in supertitles made every movement lucid and persuasive.
The second movement was a somber Sarabande, reflecting poet Brian Sonia-Wallace’s purposefully repellent imagery of decayed flowers taking on the odor of buried flesh. The third, to words by Amir Rabiyah, introduced the resonant baritone soloist, Enrico Lagasca, in a more hopeful sentiment: “If we are stardust, are we not divine?” A lighter touch followed with infectious rhythms, disco lights and handclapping built into Sonia-Wallace’s “Always Belonged to the Dance.”
The fourth poet, Andrea Assaf, urged us to “Grieve with love not hate,” here expressed by soloist Elisse Albian with pallid soprano tone that nonetheless crested with an admirably sustained high C on the call, “Bailar con libertad! Amar con libertad!” [“Dance with liberty! Love with liberty!”] Those words returned in the optimistic finale, urging that we honor them with action: “When change comes, we shall all rejoice.”
Invincibility remained the dominant theme after intermission, when assistant conductor Anthony Cabrera took the podium to recognize Juneteenth with three numbers, the best of which was the spiritual, “Go Down, Moses” performed by GMCSF’s 18-voice chamber ensemble, Tropical Wave. Salazar returned with the eponymous “Invincible,” which was, predictably, a highlight and a show stopper.
The energy level remained high for “Golden,” from the Netflix Oscar-winning KPop Demon Hunters, and peaked with Katy Perry’s hit, “Roar” — thanks to the kinetic, highly charged dancing and singing of Jonathan Sanz. The concert closed with “Get On Your Feet,” the signature song of Gloria Estefan, who — it’s hard to believe — will turn 70 next year. She was writing for a whole different generation. According to the program blurb, the title means, “rise up, stand strong, and keep going with resilience and hope.” That was the message of the evening.