Waiting for the Barbarians
Death of Classical and The Alexander S. Onassis Benefit Foundation present Waiting for the Barbarians, a sprawling, one-night-only exploration of love, loss, lust, and longing centered around the timeless poetry of C.P. Cavafy, set to brand-new music by luminaries like Rufus Wainwright & Missy Mazzoli, Laurie Anderson, Helga Davis & Petros Klampanis, Nico Muhly, Paola Prestini, and more, accompanied by The Knights and the Brooklyn Youth Chorus. Seated amidst the towering Gothic arches of Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue, this program of entirely new music will take listeners on a musical journey across genres and sound worlds, with each piece sharing the same question: what do we lose – and gain – when we give away a part of ourselves?
The Program
Chandelier
Composed by Rufus Wainwright, arranged by Missy Mazzoli
Performed by Rufus Wainwright and The Knights
Cavafy Ghost
Composed by Helga Davis & Petros Klampanis
Performed by Helga Davis, Petros Klampanis, The Knights, and Brooklyn Youth Chorus - Dianne Berkun Menaker
The Return
Composed and arranged by Dimitris Papadimitriou
Performed by Eleni Calenos and The Knights
Far Away Songs
Composed by Nico Muhly, arranged by Nathan Thatcher
Performed by Eleni Calenos and The Knights
Voices
Composed by Paola Prestini
Performed by Brooklyn Youth Chorus - Dianne Berkun Menaker
Waiting for the Barbarians
Composed by Laurie Anderson
Performed by Laurie Anderson, The Knights, and Brooklyn Youth Chorus - Dianne Berkun Menaker
About the Cavafy Festival
On the anniversary of 160 years from the birth and 90 years from the death of C. P. Cavafy, the Onassis Foundation in New York will present a ten-day festival in May 2023 in venues across the city.
The project is a collaboration between the cultural pillar of the Onassis Foundation in Athens, the Cavafy Archive, and the New York Cultural Center. Senior Advisor of Onassis USA, Karen Brooks Hopkins, will serve as Executive Producer.
The festival, in honor of C. P. Cavafy, co-curated by composer Paola Prestini, co-founder of presenting partner National Sawdust and Afroditi Panagiotakou, Director of Culture of the Onassis Foundation, will include newly commissioned live performances, digital art presentations, screenings of short films, poetry readings, literary conversations hosted by McNally Jackson bookstores, a visual rave, and many more events. Internationally renowned artists, such as the poet Robin Coste Lewis, celebrated visual artists Julie Mehretu, Nick Cave and Bob Faust, composers Nico Muhly, Rufus Wainwright, and Laurie Anderson and many more will contribute with new works.