Author: Spacious Vision
Spacious Vision--Words and Music is the former home of the Spacious Vision Song Project. Today it curates occasional essays and projects by Gerald Seminatore DMA.
“Pilgrimage” on June 27 at the Brand Library, Glendale, CA
We have recently confirmed the program and roster of performers for our upcoming concert at the Brand Library Arts Center on June 27 at 7:30 p.m. (1601 W. Mountain St, Glendale, CA 91201).
Our singers will include Katie Elizabeth Martin, Arnold Livingston Geis and Gerald Seminatore, along with pianist Mark Salters. The program “Pilgrimage” will include American songs by Samuel Barber, Aaron Copland, Richard Hundley, Charles Ives, and Lori Laitman.
This is a free concert, sponsored by the City of Glendale. We are grateful to be included on the 2014 series of concerts in this intimate and welcoming venue.
Gerald Seminatore performs Britten’s Canticle One
The online service YouTube has become ubiquitous, and many performing artists seeking a wider audience use it to post videos of their work. Our YouTube channel (www.youtube.com/spaciousvision) is drawing a growing number of viewers.
When we only have an audio track to share, it is uploaded to our SoundCloud archive (www.souncloud.com/spacious-vision). YouTube only accepts video files for upload, so if an audio track has no live video associated with it, another solution is needed to share the audio on that platform. Many people create a photo montage for video streaming with an accompanying “soundtrack.” Often these videos are amateurish or poorly done, but sometimes they illuminate the content of the music and are worthy of a look.
A few singers have used YouTube to introduce song and arias, especially those in other languages that might need a translation or subtitles. We have adopted this idea with a video for Britten’s First Canticle “My beloved is mine.”
This powerful work is based on a poem by the 17th century English “Metaphysical” poet Francis Quarles. Britten’s musical setting presents few obstacles for the listener, but the poem’s language and imagery are not immediately accessible. This video provides an introduction to the Canticle itself, as well as text and images to aid the listener in enjoying an extended vocal work that is both spiritual and ardent.
This live 2013 performance is by Gerald Seminatore and pianist Jaebon Hwang. Gerald the montage as a final project for a PowerPoint class.
Click here to view the video of Britten’s First Canticle, “My beloved is mine”
John Seesholtz in recital in Columbus, GA March 19
Baritone JOHN SEESHOLTZ and pianist CHRISTOPHER REED will perform in recital with soprano Tiffany Blake Oliver at River Center for the Performing Arts at Columbus State University in Georgia. The program is on March 19, 2014. To go to the Columbus State School of Music website for more information, click here.
Gerald Seminatore at Denver Lyric Opera Guild Competition
Gerald recently received an invitation to judge the preliminary round of the Denver Lyric Opera Guild competition. So, off he went last week to a very cold city last to spend a day hearing 36 singers with fellow judges John Baril, music director of the Central City Opera, and Gayle Shay, director of opera at Vanderbilt University. During their conference following the competition, all three shared their impressions of the performers, helped one another understand shared reservations about some of the singers, and finally ranked the contestants. They also talked about current expectations for auditioning singers at festivals like Central City, and even broached the topic of the occasionally uneasy relationship between academic performance programs and the professional world.
Perhaps the most rewarding part of the day was meeting with the contestants after the results were announced. Gerald shared his thoughts with each singer about his/her audition, and also heard from many of them about their own aspirations and challenges.
(Disclaimer: this post is not associated with any published communication of the Denver Lyric Opera Guild.)
Jonathan Mack performs “The Brisk Young Widow”
There is still music from recent Spacious Vision performances to share! Over on our SoundCloud audio archive, we have a live performance by Jonathan Mack of a relatively unknown Britten folk song setting. It’s the comedic “The Brisk Young Widow,” from 1954. (The song uses a tune from Somerset, collected by Cecil Sharp in 1905). The recording is from our Nov. 2013 “Britten in Song” concert.
Click here for Jonathan’s performance. Kristof van Grysperre is at the piano. The song has several verses, and you can seem them here, or all on the SoundCloud page.
In Chester town there liv’d
A brisk young widow.
For beauty and fine clothes
None could excel her.
She was proper stout and tall,
Her fingers long and small,
She’s a comely dame withall,
She’s a brisk young widow.
A lover soon there came,
A brisk young farmer,
With his hat turn’d up all round,
Seeking to gain her.
“My dear, for love of you
This wide world I’d go through
If you will but prove true
You shall wed a farmer.”
Says she: “I’m not for you
Nor no such fellow.
I’m for a lively lad
With lands and riches,
‘Tis not your hogs and yowes
Can maintain furbelows,
My silk and satin clothes
Are all my glory”.
“O madam, don’t be coy
For all your glory,
For fear of another day
And another story.
If the world on you should frown
Your top-knot must come down
To a Lindsey-woolsey gown.
Where is then your glory?”
At last there came that way
A sooty collier,
With his hat bent down all round,
And soon he did gain her:
Whereat the farmer swore,
“The widow’s mazed, I’m sure.
I’ll never court no more
A brisk young widow!”
Ariel Pisturino performs Britten’s “Nocturne”
Though many of Benjamin Britten’s songs were inspired by tenor Peter Pears, the song cycle “On This Island” (op. 11) was dedicated to noted English soprano Sophie Wyss. This early work is comprised of five settings of poems from W.H. Auden’s collection “Look, Stranger.” Britten set several other poems by Auden as well, but “Nocturne” is arguably the most effective of welding of Britten’s music and Auden’s unique voice. Click here for a performance of “Nocturne” by ARIEL PISTURINO, from our recent “Britten in Song” concert. Krystof van Grysperre at the piano.
Nocturne
Now through night’s caressing grip
Earth and all her oceans slip,
Capes of China slide away
From her fingers into day
And th’Americas incline
Coasts towards her shadow line.
Now the ragged vagrants creep
Into crooked holes to sleep:
Just and unjust, worst and best,
Change their places as they rest:
Awkward lovers like in fields
Where disdainful beauty yields:
While the splendid and the proud
Naked stand before the crowd
And the losing gambler gains
And the beggar entertains:
May sleep’s healing power extend
Through these hours to our friend.
Unpursued by hostile force,
Traction engine, bull or horse
Or revolting succubus;
Calmly till the morning break
Let him lie, then gently wake.
SongFest at Colburn announces 2014 artist line-up
SongFest, the annual festival of art song at the Colburn School in Los Angeles, has just announced its faculty line-up for Summer 2014. Festival artist/teachers will include soprano Lucy Shelton, baritones Sanford Sylvan and Rudolf Piernay, composer/pianist John Musto, and the inimitable pianist and collaborator Graham Johnson. The repertoire for SongFest concerts is always intriguing, provocative, and satisfying, and we are looking forward to it! More information at www.songfest.us
Pamela Dellal performs music of Carl Phillipe Emmanuel Bach, Feb. 25
In observance of the 300th anniversary of the birthday of Carl Phillip Emanuel Bach, our own PAMELA DELLAL will present a recital of his songs and cantatas at the Boston Conservatory on Feb. 25. Peter Sykes will partner with her at the clavichord. Pamela has explored this repertoire for a number of years, and this concert is sure to be a unique and artistically satisfying event. For more information, click here to go the Boston Conservatory’s event page
.
Mark Abel’s “Terrain of the Heart” now available
Mark Abel (born 1948) is an American composer of classical music. His work – cast primarily as a flexible rethinking of the art song tradition — is marked by straightforward tonal language, striking vocal writing, and an avoidance of overtly modern compositional techniques. Mark has described his idiom as a post-modern synthesis of classical and rock styles. To learn more about Mark’s music, click here to go to his website.
The trio
of our own ARIEL PISTURINO, soprano Janet Chamberlin, and pianist Victoria Kirsch are featured on the just released “Terrain of the Heart,” a new recording of Abel’s songs on the Delos label. It is available for streaming or download; click here to go to the Delos website.
Congratulations to all involved with this project!
Spacious Vision 