BBC Philharmonic - Anthracite Fields

BBC Philharmonic Orchestra
BBC Singers
John Storgårds conductor

Julia Wolfe Anthracite Fields

‘I guess I have a bias towards the grit.’  – Julia Wolfe

Grit courses through Julia Wolfe’s Anthracite Fields, her Pulitzer Prize-winning oratorio for choir and ensemble that serves as a musical memorial to American miners and their struggle.

Wolfe grew up in coal-rich Pennsylvania – with vast deposits of anthracite, coal’s purest form – and saw firsthand how intertwined the means of fuelling a nation were with human toil and sacrifice. Through extensive research and oral histories, Wolfe weaves together stories of labour, loss, and resistance – stories that could just as easily come from the Yorkshire pits or the South Lancashire coalfields, where mining was not just a job but a way of life.

We hear testimonies from men risking serious injury, communities remembering the fallen, the fiery words of union leader John M. Lewis, and a few voices daring to hope. Wolfe’s writing is equal parts fluid and direct, drawing from her established sources — chorales, rock music, minimalism — as she looks unsparingly at the past.

Death and danger, community and power, all delivered with Wolfe’s trademark forthrightness.

This symphonic arrangement of Anthracite Fields is a BBC Philharmonic Orchestra commission, in partnership with the Louisville Orchestra.