Harvey Milk: A Cantata

Harvey Milk: A Cantata, is a 2012 choral work by Jack Curtis Dubowsky featuring unpublished texts by Harvey Milk. The 20 minute Harvey Milk for mixed chorus and piano was jointly commissioned by the Lesbian/Gay Chorus of San Francisco and Lick Wilmerding High School, with the cooperation of the Estate of Harvey Milk and the Harvey Milk Archives / Scott Smith Collection of the San Francisco Public Library. Susan Goldstein, City Archivist of San Francisco, gave Conductor and Artistic Director William Sauerland full access to Milk's original papers, which yielded texts that have never been published before. Sauerland's research was assisted by Tim Wilson, the archivist of the Harvey Milk collection.  Texts were compiled and edited by Sauerland and composer Jack Curtis Dubowsky. The final cantata text is entirely by Milk, culled from both well-known speeches as well as rare documents. The Estate of Harvey Milk granted special permission for the use of these texts. First premiered June 22, 2012 at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and July 9, 2012 at the GALA Choruses Festival in Denver, CO. Harvey Milk was a community activist and the first openly gay man elected to serve on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. Milk successfully rallied the state against the homophobic Briggs Initiative, and was able to bridge disparate communities as well as labor groups.  Milk served in the U.S. Navy, worked on Broadway, and earned the nickname "Mayor of Castro Street" in San Francisco where he ran a camera shop. Milk was assassinated along with Mayor George Moscone in 1978. Milk's life has had a lasting influence upon civil rights and politics, and has inspired two biographies, two feature films, and an opera. Also Available for SATB, Piano, and Woodwind Quintet: Full Score SM-12-0002A; Woodwinds Parts Package SM-12-0002AX.