The choral group Coro Lux will be joined by composer Craig Hella Johnson in two special performances of his original work Considering Matthew Shepard in New Mexico this weekend.
In 1998, 21-year-old college student Matthew Shepard was murdered in Laramie, Wyoming. He was brutally beaten, tied to a fence, and left to die. Shepard was a gay man, and many have speculated over the years that he was killed for his identity.
Johnson wrote his Grammy-nominated piece in Shepard’s honor in 2016, and now, 27 years after Shepard’s death, Johnson will conduct the Albuquerque-based choral group through his piece.
In an interview with KHFM’s Kathlene Ritch, Johnson spoke about his reaction to learning of Shepard’s murder:
“There was something about it that just affected me in a very particularly grievous way,” Johnson said. “I felt so many things. So the sort of short version of all that is that, I sort of resolved at that point that I have to respond to this in some way, and I want to respond in some way musically.”
Johnson’s three-part fusion oratorio will contain music across a variety of genres, and close with an epilogue of peace, as he calls it,
“To come together as an audience and a group of performers to hold each other basically and to maybe allow some of these questions to motivate us forward,” Johnson said.
Coro Lux performed Considering Matthew Shepard back in 2019, but the upcoming performance will be particularly special due to Johnson’s presence.
Considering Matthew Shepard will be performed in Santa Fe on Saturday, and Albuquerque on Sunday.
