Friday 6 February 2015

Joyce DiDonato at the Stonewall Inn

Joyce DiDonato
Joyce DiDonato
A few days ago, mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato popped into the Stonewall Inn, in New York and performed Dido's Lament from Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. Yes, you did read that right; one of the greatest singers around today performed in a gay bar in Greenwich Village, accompanied by Julliard415, the Julliard School's period instrument ensemble.

The Stonewall Inn is in fact the successor to the bar raided by New York police in 1969 which led to the Stonewall Riots from which the modern gay rights movement grew. The bar is also close to the spot where Mark Carson, a gay man was shot and killed almost two years ago; now regarded as a hate crime by the police.

This is just the latest in events in which DiDonato has continued to show her ongoing support for lesbian and gay rights. At the 2013 Proms she dedicated Somewhere Over the Rainbow to LGBT voices silenced by Russia's anti-gay laws and at the Santa Fe Opera, she dedicated a performance to a gay New Mexican teen who took his life after being bullied.

The video of the event was made by NPR and can be seen after the break:


Elsewhere on this blog:

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