Susan Graham Gatsby" (Jordan Baker), Jake Heggie's "Dead Man Walking" (Sister Helen Prejean), and Tobias Picker's "An American Tragedy" (Sondra Finchley). Graham is a noted champion of the French song repertoire and of songs by contemporary American composers, including Ned Rorem and Lowell Liebermann. Graham made her Carnegie Hall recital debut in April 2003, and a recording of this recital was later released. Graham sang "Bless This House" at George W. Bush's second inauguration on January 20, 2005, and Schubert's "Ave Maria" at the nationally televised funeral mass for Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts on August 29, 2009. She is a
Helen of Sparta (play) Helen of Sparta (play) Helen of Sparta is a tragicomic play by Jacob M. Appel. It premiered at the Venus Theatre in Laurel, Maryland on January 23, 2009. The play starred Julia Heynen as Helen, D. Grant Cloyd as Paris, Phil Amico as Protesilaus, Mary Burke-Hueffmeier as Laodamia and Ellie Nicoll as Oenone. Critic Ted Ying singled out Heynen's performance as a "forceful personification of the face that launched a thousand ships" and praised her as "beautiful, confident, [and] charismatic." The play retells the story of the Trojan War from Helen's point of view. Paris kidnaps Helen from Sparta and