New World Symphony Commemorates Holocaust With New Composition

This year marks the 80th anniversary of the end of the Second World War and the Holocaust — and the New World Symphony remembers.

As part of the months-long "Resonance of Remembrance: World War II and the Holocaust," New World Symphony fellows will perform the world premiere of Cuban-American composer and Florida International University professor Orlando Jacinto García's Prohibido for string orchestra at New World Center on Sunday, January 26.

Michael Linville, dean of instrumental performance at NWS, says it's uncommon for the organization to use world events as markers in its programming.

"It was felt that this was an anniversary that deserved to be commemorated, partly because a lot of the survivors who might still be alive probably won't be for very much longer," Linville explains. "I think the feeling was that they wanted to actually honor and celebrate these people's contributions before they passed away."

García, a Miami-based composer, says he was deeply affected by I Never Saw Another Butterfly, a collection of children's poems and drawings from the Terezin concentration camp. The book moved him to create a piece that would carry on the brutal memory of those interned there.

"I picked it up at the Holocaust Museum in Washington about 25 years ago, I would say," García adds. "It had a huge impact then and still has a big impact now."

It's not the first time García has composed music centered around the impacts of the Holocaust. Prohibido, a larger, mixed-media composition, springs from his third string quartet, named "I Never Saw a Butterfly" after the book that inspired it. Before that, he wrote a piece called "Auschwitz (Nunca se Olvidarán)" — meaning "they will never be forgotten."

"His idea was that he wanted to use that string quartet as kind of a jumping-off place for a new piece for string orchestra," Linville says. "Some of the themes of the string quartet appear in the new piece."

The composition will be accompanied by Miami City Ballet dancers Lucy Nevin and Alexander Kaden, performing choreography by Ariel Rose. Video projections by NWS videographer Michael Matamoros will further add to the piece's visual component.

García has also written spoken word in both English and Spanish to accompany the orchestra.

"The ensemble has to recite some texts that I've written that allude to repression," García says. "That's in different parts of the piece, where they have to whisper."

Despite all the work he's put into the piece, García says that the performance will ultimately be defined, in part, by what the audience brings to it. The unique perspectives of so many people, he said, are additive.

"There's not one thing that I want you to hear," García adds. "Whatever you're hearing, you're hearing. You're bringing your own experiences and references to the tape."

Chamber Music: The Chamber Cello. 2 p.m. Sunday, January 26, at New World Center, 500 17th St., Miami Beach; 305-673-3330; nws.edu. Tickets cost $15 to $40.