Shakespeare inspires new composition
By VIVA SARAH PRESS for The Jerusalem Post


Before Ophelia in Shakespeare's Hamlet descends into madness, she mutters: 'Good night ladies, good night sweet ladies.'

It is this text that jumped out at composer Ella Milch-Sheriff when she was skimming through the English playwright's works in search of text around which to compose her latest work.

The Ra'anana Symphonette had requested her to arrange a work centered on Shakespeare's canon, and she chose to focus on the three dominant female characters in the tragedies Hamlet, Othello, and Romeo and Juliet: Ophelia, Desdemona, and Juliet.
The world premiere of 'Good Night Sweet Ladies' will take place at Yad Lebanim in Ra'anana.

If Milch-Sheriff's past work is anything to go by, this latest work is sure to be a success. In March 2003, her piece 'Can Heaven Be Void for Singer, Narrator, and Orchestra' was premiered by the Ra'anana Symphonette and went on to win great acclaim from critics and audiences. The piece, based on texts from a diary written by the composer's father during the Holocaust, has since been performed in Europe and the US. "