Beginnings, Middles, and Ends
V: Testaments
Friday, February 4, 2022 7:30PM
Digital Release: Monday, February 21, 2022
First Unitarian Church of Brooklyn, 119 Pierrepont St, Brooklyn, NY 11201
Pre-concert lecture at 7:00PM by Patricia Mainardi (CUNY)
Britten’s Songs and Proverbs of William Blake ponders the infinite; Shostakovich’s 7 Romances by Aleksander Blok stares down mortality; Hugo Wolf’s Michelangelo-Lieder is the composers’ final testament before losing his mind.
Benjamin Britten: Songs and Proverbs of William Blake
Dimitri Shostakovich: 7 Romances by Aleksander Blok
Hugo Wolf: Michelangelo-Lieder
Alexandra Nowakowski, soprano; Michael Kelly, Brian Mextorf, baritone
Mike Brofman, Renate Rohlfing, piano
Stanichka Dimitrova, violin; Sofia Nowik, cello
VI: Fin-du-Siècle
March 4, 2022 7:30PM
Digital Release: Monday, March 21
Brahms’ final Four Serious Songs give a tragic finality to his life and work. Berg’s 7 Early Songs and Strauss’ 4 Last Song, though written 40 years apart, look back on Late Romanticism with aching nostalgia.
IV: Evidence of Things Not Seen
Friday, January 7, 2022 7:30PM
Digital Release: Monday, January 24
Ned Rorem’s magnum opus explores the entire breadth of life in this evening-length song cycle. Evidence of Things Not Seen captures everything that makes up the human experience in song.
III: Mortality Mansions
Friday, December 3, 2021 7:30PM
Digital Release: Monday, December 20, 2021
Two titans of American vocal music, Tom Cipullo and Herschel Garfein, explore the final stages of life through some of their most ambitious and poignant works.
II: Remembering
Friday, November 5, 2021 7:30PM
Digital Release: Monday, November 22, 2021
Two monumental British song cycles explore the fleeting wonder of youth. Finzi’s A Young Man’s Exhortation is filled with the tenderness of first love, while Vaughan Williams’ Songs of Travel looks back at youth with bittersweet wisdom.
I: Mörike Liederbuch
Friday, October 1, 2021 7:30PM
Digital Release: Monday, October 18, 2021
Hugo Wolf made his genius known to the world with his first major work, the Mörike Songbook. Composed at age 28, these songs are teeming with youthful energy, passionate drama, and slapstick humor.