On July 31, Thomas Hampson brings his Song of America: Beyond Liberty project to the Tanglewood Festival, featuring guest artist, pianist Lara Downes, and the Beyond Liberty Players. Together they bring the American songbook to Ozawa Hall and explore the influential people and monumental events that helped create and define America.

Song of America: Beyond Liberty illuminates and questions the role of core American values such as freedom and brotherhood, and it engages how these values have shaped the course of American culture. By pairing music, poetry, rhetoric, and history, Hampson introduces us to his unique examination of Americana. The show first premiered in a production by Francesca Zambello at the Glimmerglass Festival in 2018. The libretto is based on a text by Royce Vavrek.

Hampson collaborated with Ms. Downes on her tribute album named For Lenny, released by Sony Classical in 2018. The recording centers around Bernstein’s Anniversaries for Piano, musical portraits he composed for his family and friends; it also features works dedicated to Bernstein by American composers including Stephen Sondheim, John Corigliano, Stephen Schwartz, and Ned Rorem. Purchase links and more information are available via Hampson’s Recordings.

The show will travel to all 50 US states, plus Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico over the next several seasons. In the 2019/20 season, it will tour to Tuscon, Arizona, and Seattle, Washington. To learn more about Song of America: Beyond Liberty, click here.