by Daniel Hathaway
It’s an off-year for the biennial Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival, but the organizers like to keep a buzz going during the hiatus. This year’s featured artist is mezzo-soprano Michelle DeYoung, one of the most versatile singers on the international circuit. In partnership with her longtime pianist, Kevin Murphy, she’ll bring a recital of vocal music by Berlioz, Debussy, Brahms, Purcell and Mahler and a set of Spirituals to the Gartner Auditorium stage at the Cleveland Museum of Art on Wednesday evening, May 18 at 7:30 pm. She returns to Cleveland next season to sing the Verdi Requiem with The Cleveland Orchestra.
We reached the very engaging singer by telephone earlier this month at her home in the Rockies in Evergreen, Colorado, where she was enjoying a few days of rest and relaxation. (Our conversation was briefly interrupted when a pine tree her husband was felling to prevent the spread of pine beetles went the wrong way and fell on a power line — but all turned out well!) [Read more…]