Details, Reservations, Online Payment:
Sunday, April 14, at 3:00pm
Kinderhook Reformed Church
21 Broad Street, Kinderhook, NY 12106
Brahms Requiem
Ein deutsches Requiem
David Smith, Artistic Director
Broad Street Chorale
Broad Street Orchestra
- Heather Green, soprano
- Richard Byrne, baritone
- David Smith, conductor
Contribution $20. Handicapped accessible

At 3:00pm on Sunday, April 14 the orchestral and choral forces of Concerts in the Village (CITV) perform together once again, in one of the most moving works in all of music literature, the great Requiem (Ein deutsches Requiem) of Johannes Brahms.
Unlike nearly every other requiem, this well-known masterpiece is very much a celebration of life rather than a liturgically-based memorial to the dead. Once heard, the beauty of Brahms’ writing cannot easily be forgotten.
With this performance CITV welcomes soprano Heather Green and baritone Richard Byrne in their regional concert debuts. Over 80 singers and instrumentalists will be performing. CITV Artistic Director David Smith conducts.
Internationally acclaimed soprano Heather Green has been heralded for her recent portrayals of Richard Strauss’s Salome in California and New York City. Other well-received operatic roles include Senta in Der fliegende Holländer and Sieglinde in Die Walküre. She has also performed in Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West, and as Lady MacBeth in Verdi’s MacBeth. In addition to her operatic roles, Ms. Green enjoys collaborating with contemporary composers, having performed the world or New York premieres of works by Gene Pritsker, Luis Andrei Cobo, Patricia Burgess, Yoav Gal, and Thomas Carlo Bo. Ms. Green has been a selected emerging artist with Saint Petersburg Opera, FL and is a two-time recipient of the Mellon Grant for Creative Research.
Baritone Richard Byrne has performed with many of the world’s most prestigious opera companies and orchestras. As an apprentice at Wolf Trap Opera, he captured the ear of Beverly Sills and was invited by her to perform at New York City Opera in 1988. Over the course of seventeen subsequent seasons there, he sang 423 performances of 27 different roles. Mr. Byrne was also privileged to sing for seven seasons at the Metropolitan Opera, as well as with the opera companies of Washington, Houston, Dallas, Minneapolis, New Orleans, and other major cities. He has also sung with major orchestras, including the London Symphony Orchestra under Sir Colin Davis and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra under Sir Georg Solti. At the age of 18, Mr. Byrne sang Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem in his very first performance with an orchestra. He moved to the village of Kinderhook three years ago.
“How fortunate we are,” says CITV Artistic Director David Smith, “to have such a committed chorus, orchestra and soloists for the Requiem of Brahms. I know few works which combine warmth and drama in such a perfectly balanced way. This will be an experience equally special for all who will be performing and all who will be listening.”
Heather Green
Heather Green
Internationally acclaimed soprano Heather Green is excited to return to the Hudson Valley as a soloist in CITV’s performance of Ein deutsches Requiem by Johannes Brahms. Ms. Green has been heralded for her recent portrayals of Richard Strauss’s Salome, with the West Bay Opera in Palo Alto, CA (2017), and with the Black Orchid Theater in New York (2018). Other well-received roles include Senta in Der fliegende Holländer and Sieglinde in Die Walküre (in a staged reading with Columbia County’s own Chatham Camerata). She has also performed in Puccini’s La Fanciulla del West, and as Lady MacBeth in Verdi’s MacBeth. In addition to her operatic roles, Ms. Green very much enjoys collaborating with contemporary composers, having recently performed the world premiere of Gene Pritsker’s “Splice” with the Eclectic Music Extravaganza at Sowieso Neukölln and the New York premiere of Luis Andrei Cobo’s “It’s About Time” with the Composers Concordance. In past seasons she has performed the title role in the world premiere of Patricia Burgess’ Yeshe, Queen of Tibet in Boudanath, Nepal, as well as the world premieres of Yoav Gal’s Mosheh (as Bitia) and 3weeks (as Aspasianus), and Thomas Carlo Bo’s Shadows of the City (as Lizzie). Ms. Green has been a selected emerging artist with Saint Petersburg Opera, FL, a two-time recipient of the Mellon Grant for Creative Research, and a winner of the LISMA scholarship. She is also a sought-after lyricist, and holds degrees from Pratt Institute of Art and Design and The Swedish Institute of Health Sciences. This afternoon she makes her debut with Concerts in the Village.
Richard Byrne
Richard Byrne
Throughout a career spanning twenty-five years, baritone Richard Byrne has performed with many of the world’s most prestigious opera companies and orchestras. As an apprentice at Wolf Trap Opera, he captured the ear of Beverly Sills and was invited by her to perform at New York City Opera in 1988. Over the course of seventeen subsequent seasons there, he sang 423 performances of 27 different roles. Mr. Byrne was also privileged to sing for seven seasons at the Metropolitan Opera, as well as with the opera companies of Washington, Houston, Dallas, Minneapolis, New Orleans, and other major cities. In 1995 he made his European debut in Nice and went on to perform in Geneva, Marseille, Vienna, Toulouse, Dublin, Tokyo, Santiago, Chile, Hong Kong and many other cities throughout the world. He has also sung with major orchestras, including the London Symphony Orchestra (Sir Colin Davis), the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (Sir Georg Solti) and others. At the age of 18, Mr. Byrne sang Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem in his very first performance with an orchestra. Since moving to Kinderhook full-time three years ago, he has appreciated the offerings of Concerts in the Village (the Broad Street Chorale and Broad Street Orchestra) very much, and feels privileged to be performing with them this afternoon.
David Smith
David Smith is Artistic Director of Concerts in the Village and Conductor of its resident ensembles, the Broad Street Chorale and the Broad Street Orchestra. He holds undergraduate and graduate degrees from Harvard in English Literature and in Musicology respectively, and an M.Phil. from Yale for advanced studies in music theory, where he was a student of the theorist Allen Forte and an Instructor in Music. He was also a student of Nadia Boulanger and Jean Casadesus in Fontainebleau, France, and a Conducting Fellow at the Aspen Music Festival and School. David Smith has conducted the Harvard-Radcliffe Chorus, the Orchestra Sine Nomine, and the New Haven Chorale, among other groups. His repertoire of orchestral, choral, chamber and keyboard (piano, organ, harpsichord) music is extensive. He was born in Troy, NY, where an early and influential teacher was Russell Locke. David Smith is past President of the Columbia County Historical Society and The Fifty Group of Columbia County. Along with flutist Elizabeth Chinery and cellist Jay Shulman, he is a member of the Broad Street Trio. David Smith is founder of Concerts in the Village.
Map to Our Concert
Kinderhook Reformed Church
CITV concerts are made possible by the generous support of many individual, institutional and business supporters, including the T. Backer Fund, CITV Emerging Singer Fund, The Alexander and Marjorie Hover Foundation, Hudson River Bank and Trust Company Foundation, Eugene M. Lang Foundation, Price Chopper Golub Foundation, and Stewart’s Shops. Kinderhook Reformed Church is especially acknowledged for its many in-kind donations