“Requiem for Orlando,” a community performance of Mozart’s Requiem, will be performed on Tuesday, June 14, 2016 at 8 pm to honor the victims of the shooting at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, FL.

The concert was organized by Austin Stewart (BM ’09, voice, and a current musicology graduate student at the University of Michigan School of Music, Theatre & Dance (SMTD), and Kevin Fitzgerald, an alumnus of the school (MM ’15, orchestral conducting) who will conduct the concert. Through a social media and email campaign they launched on Sunday, Stewart and Fitzgerald were able to bring together 50 instrumentalists and more than 135 singers to participate in the concert. The performers include SMTD students, faculty and alumni, as well as representatives of many local orchestras, such as the Ann Arbor, Dearborn and Rochester Hills symphonies, and the Michigan Philharmonic.

“In the aftermath of the tragedy in Orlando, there has been a lot of discussion among friends about building sanctuaries,” said Stewart. “We are striving to do that by creating a safe space with music, by creating a tapestry of voices representing every race, creed, sexuality, and background. This is a timeless piece that expresses the full range of emotions that come with grief and healing. Our hope is for the concert to build solidarity and strength through music and communal reflection.”

The performance will take place at Hill Auditorium, 825 N University Ave, Ann Arbor. The concert is free and open to the public, no tickets are required.