The Origin quartet, Anonymous 4; tenor Todd Graber; bass Eric Johnson; the women's vocal ensemble, Kitka; the SUNY Oswego College Choir; Oswego College-Community Orchestra; and the Oswego Festival Chorus. Of the over 200 performers, about 80 were students at SUNY Oswego. The projected video images which served as a backdrop to the performance were by filmmaker Bill Morrison. The Origin The Origin is an opera/oratorio composed by Richard Einhorn to a libretto by Richard Einhorn and Catherine Barnett based on the writings of Charles Darwin. The oratorio takes its title from Darwin's 1859 "On the Origin of Species". The work was commissioned
Reactions to On the Origin of Species breeding that would eventually form part of "The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication". He wrote to Asa Gray and used the example of fantail pigeons to argue against Gray's belief "that variation has been led along certain beneficial lines", with the implication of Creationism rather than Natural Selection. Over the winter he organised a third edition of the "Origin", adding an introductory historical sketch. Asa Gray had published three supportive articles in the "Atlantic Monthly". Darwin persuaded Gray to publish them as a pamphlet, and was delighted when Gray came up with the title of "Natural Selection Not