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Francis Poulenc’s 1957 opera Dialogues des Carmélites has the virtues of necessity. Director Robert Carsten’s production puts these virtues before us in simple black and white. The virtues begin with the story: Blanche, an aristocrat afraid of the French Revolution who hopes to find refuge in a nunnery, becomes a refugee of religious persecution, and chooses to die a martyr with her sisters.

There are musical moments that lift you up into a jet stream you ride till your feet are on the pavement again. Last evening in Koerner Hall was a flow of such moments as the Amici Chamber Ensemble celebrated their first set of twenty-five musical years.