[Airdate: June 8, 2022]
This weekend at the Maltz Performing Arts Center, you can see the Cleveland premiere of The Sparks Fly Upward, and opera set in Berlin during WWII which tells the stories of three German families, two Jewish and one Christian, who are thrust headlong into the Holocaust. The opera was composed by CWRU law professor Cathy Lesser Mansfield. WCLV’s John Mills spoke to the composer about the work.
The Sparks Fly Upward
June 9-12, 2022
Maltz Performing Arts Center
Written and composed by Cathy Lesser Mansfield
Directed by Jeffrey Lesser
Conducted by Daniel Singer
Featuring Cantor Kathy Wolfe Sebo
The Sparks Fly Upward begins on October 28, 1938 with the deportation of Polish Jews residing in Germany to Poland, and concludes with the liberation of Berlin in May 1945 and the re-dedication of the Neue Synagogue in Berlin in 1995. At times the families turn to the Book of Job for diversion, reassurance, and enlightenment. Job’s suffering, and the contest between good and evil represented in his story, are reflected in the lives of the characters, who boldly face the question of man’s obligation to man in times of moral and political crisis.
The Sparks Fly Upward, told completely through lush music and rich lyrics, is a story of courage, friendship, love, faith, hope and the power of one person to alter the course of another’s life. Set in Nazi Germany, The Sparks Fly Upward is woven from the stories of those who were there.