More Between Heaven and Earth: Thomas Jefferson, Maria Cosway, and the Music and Philosophy of the Enlightenment

Salon/Sanctuary Concerts presents

More Between Heaven and Earth

Sunday, December 8th at 6:00pm at The Bissel Room of Fraunces Tavern, 54 Pearl Street, NY, NY 10004

Featuring Melissa Errico as Maria Cosway and Campbell Scott as Thomas Jefferson with Judith Hawking as the Narrator

Jessica Gould, soprano & Tony Boutté, tenor
Members of the Sebastians
Script and Stage Direction by Erica Gould

Campbell Scott plays Thomas Jefferson and Melissa Errico reprises her role as the stunning and trailblazing 18thcentury Italian singer, composer, and painter Maria Cosway in More Between Heaven and Earth.

Sparks flew between the widowed Jefferson and the recently married Maria Cosway when they met in Paris, and their passionate correspondence lasted for almost 40 years. More Between Heaven and Earth, an original music-theatre work, incorporates the text of that correspondence, music Maria and Jefferson heard together in Paris, and songs, sung by Errico, that Maria herself composed for Jefferson.

Errico and Scott will be joined by soprano Jessica Gould, tenor Tony Boutté, and chamber orchestra for the environmentally staged performance, directed and with a script by Erica Gould and produced by Salon/Sanctuary Concerts, to take place at the historic 18th century Fraunces Tavern in the Financial District.

The oldest surviving structure in Manhattan, Fraunces Tavern housed the US Dept of Foreign Affairs when Jefferson was Secretary of State, and is the actual building where Jefferson wrote some of the letters used in the script. The performance promises to be an exciting and intimate evening that brings to vivid life the passionate, moving, and star-crossed relationship of Jefferson and Cosway, the turbulence of the French Revolution, and Jefferson’s revolutionary views about the role of religion in American society. A treat for lovers of history, romance, politics, and music.