by Daniel Hathaway
If the Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival has its way, the tradition of intimate performances of vocal music for one singer and one pianist will continue long into the future. And if all such recitals were as engagingly sung and played as the one that Canadian baritone Elliot Madore and Russian-born pianist Natalia Katyukova gave in Gamble Auditorium at Baldwin Wallace Conservatory on Sunday evening, March 15, that art form has a secure destiny. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
After a week of intense master classes, a lecture, and a pair of recitals by soprano Joan Rodgers with pianist Roger Vignoles, and baritone Andrew Garland with pianist Warren Jones, the ten singer-pianist teams for whom the twenty-second Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival was designed got the opportunity to show off their vocal and pianistic wares — and presumably some newly-acquired skills — in a free recital in Gamble Auditorium on Saturday evening, May 24.
Even with each team allotted only three songs, it could have turned into a long evening, but executive director Joanne Uniatowski and her team kept things moving along at a brisk clip and held the intermission to the announced ten minutes. Though the thirty songs sped by in a mere 90 minutes or so, the proceedings never felt rushed, just efficient.
If Saturday’s performers are any indication, the tradition of the Art Song is alive and in good voices and hands. Any of the ten pairs of singer/pianists would have been capable of sustaining the interest of an audience for an entire evening, though of course there were some standouts. [Read more…]
by Timothy Robson
For the past 22 years George Vassos, retired chair of the voice department at the Cleveland Institute of Music, has labored mightily to ensure the preservation of that rarified musical event, the art song recital. In 1985 Vassos established an annual Art Song Festival at CIM; since 2004 it has been resident at Baldwin Wallace University in Berea and is now biennial, with occasional special events in the off-years.
The 2014 festival is underway at BW this week and features several masterclasses with auditioned singer/pianist teams coached by guest artists, as well as recitals by the guest artists and a final recital by the teams themselves. On Tuesday evening, May 20, British soprano Joan Rodgers and pianist Roger Vignoles gave the first of this year’s artist recitals.
Joan Rodgers is relatively unknown in American musical circles except through her numerous recordings, including an acclaimed performance as The Governess in Britten’s The Turn of the Screw. [Read more…]
by Daniel Hathaway
The twenty-second Art Song Festival, now firmly established at Baldwin Wallace University, got down to business on Monday, May 19 and will culminate in a free recital by ten singer-pianist teams on Saturday, May 24. In between, those teams will receive coachings in master classes from British soprano Joan Rodgers, American baritone Andrew Garland (left), and the celebrated collaborative pianists Roger Vignoles and Warren Jones.
Participants will also have the opportunity to hear their teachers in action in two evening recitals. Rodgers and Vignoles will perform in Gamble Auditorium on Tuesday, May 20, followed by Garland and Jones on Thursday, May 22. Both performances begin at 8:00 pm and tickets are required.
Dedicated to the advancement of one of the most intimate and expressive forms of chamber music, the Art Song Festival was first organized by George Vassos at the Cleveland Institute of Music in 1985 and featured two distinguished artists, Elly Ameling and Gérard Souzay. Following a one-year hiatus in 1989, the festival was relaunched as an every-other-year event, and eventually moved to Baldwin Wallace, where it is now headed by BW’s voice department chair Joanne Uniatowski. [Read more…]