Performance Features Orchestra and Choirs, Narration by Sen. Eileen Donoghue

11/19/2013

Contacts for media: Christine Gillette, 978-934-2209 or Christine_Gillette@uml.edu and Nancy Cicco, 978-934-4944 or Nancy_Cicco@uml.edu

* Media Advisory *

Friday, Nov. 22
7:30 p.m.

What: UMass Lowell will commemorate the 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s death with a concert celebrating his life and legacy. The event is free and open to the public.

Performed by the University Orchestra under the direction of music faculty member Mark Latham, the program will include “Symphony No. 1” by Beethoven; the funeral march from Brahms’ “Requiem,” which will be performed with the University Choirs; and Aaron Copland’s “Lincoln Portrait,” which will include text from the Gettysburg Address narrated by state Sen. Eileen Donoghue. Written in homage to President Abraham Lincoln, the Copland piece evokes the many parallels between Lincoln and Kennedy. This week also marks the 150th anniversary of Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address.

The Kennedy family has an enduring connection to UMass Lowell and its predecessor institutions. In 1945, Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. established a Lowell Textile Institute endowment to research silk and nylon – materials used in parachutes – in memory of his eldest son, Joseph, a Navy pilot who was killed in action in World War II bombing mission.

In 1956, Lowell Technological Institute awarded an honorary doctorate to then-Sen. John F. Kennedy for his public service and leadership. By the end of the decade, he and Jacqueline Kennedy returned to Lowell on the campaign trail on the way to the White House. The excitement the couple generated on campus and in the community during their visits is captured in rarely seen photographs from the Poirier Collection, which is housed at UMass Lowell’s Center for Lowell History. 

Where: Durgin Concert Hall, South Campus, 35 Wilder St., Lowell. For directions and parking information, contact UMass Lowell media relations.