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A concert version of the monumental musical “Les Misérables” will be presented during a concert on Sunday, Nov. 13, by the College Singers at SUNY Cortland.

Directed by Stephen B. Wilson of the Performing Arts Department, the concert will begin at 2 p.m. in the Dowd Fine Arts Theater. The performance is free and open to the public.

The musical, an adaptation of the novel by the French author Victor Hugo, has been an audience favorite for a quarter century. It tells the story of life in France following the Revolution. The musical setting by Claude-Michel Schoenberg, with lyrics by Herbert Kretzmer, focuses on the struggle of the lower class in Paris and its environs to survive the poverty imposed upon it by the ruling class.

The central figure in the play, seen only in the first act and appearing as a ghost in the second, is the poor but honest Fantine (played by Samantha Rey), a factory worker who must sell her body to pay for the upkeep of her daughter Cosette (Angelia Golden), who is living with the venal Thenardiers (Kyle O’Rourke and Catherine Pluta), a couple who run an inn outside of Paris. Valjean (Tim Fuchs), a former escaped prisoner and now the factory owner and mayor of the town, loves Fantine and vows to care for her daughter after Fantine’s death from consumption.

Other characters of importance are Marius (Will Rivera), a young student who falls in love the now-grown-up Cosette; Eponine (Nicole Herlihy), the daughter of the Thenardiers who secretly loves Marius; Javert (Chad Henke), the constable who pursues Valjean throughout the play; Gavroche (Grace McGeoch), a precocious young boy who fights on the side of the rebels, and Enjolras (Charles O’Connor), the firebrand leftist student who leads the rebellion against the upper class. 

Some of the better-known songs from the show include Fantine’s “I Dreamed a Dream,” Eponine’s “On My Own,” the chorus’s “Anthem” “Do you hear the people sing?” and the climactic finale of Act I, “One Day More.” Catherine Skojec plays the role of Little Cosette and sings “Castle on a Cloud.”

Because this performance is a concert version of the musical, narration will be furnished to inform the audience of the portions of the play not presented. Alicia Dee Leduc will serve as narrator.

Piano accompaniment is furnished by the Performing Arts Department’s staff pianist Richard Montgomery, with lighting by Joel Pape.

This concert is sponsored in part by the Student Activity Fee.  

For more information, contact Wilson at (607) 753-4615.