OPERA NEW - Franchetti Songs ". . . gracefully delivered by the fine spinto tenor H. Steven Smith. Even in extended higher register passages, Smith sings with effortless warmth, counterbalancing the sometimes aloof-if-impassioned texts and vocal lines. Smith is sensitively accompanied by pianist David See, who also favors a warm approach. . . .The recording is particularly enhanced by the regally beautiful and sonorous voice of bass-baritone Edwin Crossley-Mercer, expertly accompanied by pianist Jason Paul Peterson. . . It's not to be missed. — Arlo McKinnon
FORUM OPERA - Les quelque 180 auditeurs réunis le 31 août dans l’auditorium du musée du Petit Palais ne se doutaient peut-être pas qu’ils assistaient à une création mondiale. Ce jour-là, en effet, le baryton franco-irlandais Edwin Crossley-Mercer donnait un récital au programme curieux, puisqu’il entrelaçait à des mélodies françaises bien connues (Debussy, Fauré, Duparc…) de larges extraits, donnés en première audition publique, des Wilde Songs de Michael Linton.
THE TENNESSEAN - Music duo and YouTube stars Pomplamoose visited Middle Tennessee State University for a Q-and-A session with students Thursday afternoon.
MTSU SIDELINES - Music duo and YouTube stars Pomplamoose will visit MTSU for a Q-and-A session in the Wright Music Building on Thursday afternoon.
THE NASHVILLE SCENE - Middle Tennessee composer Michael Linton is heading to Carnegie Hall, where his two new song cycles will receive their world-premiere performances on Monday night. Let’s hope New York City is ready for these spicy works.
Linton, a composition professor at Middle Tennessee State University, has set to music the original poetry and translations of contemporary Italian-American author Cody Franchetti. He’s also composed music to selected verse of the ancient Roman poet Catullus. Both works will present extreme technical challenges to the musicians. But the 17 songs of Catullus, which Linton has titled Carmina Catulli, will test the sensibilities of the audience as well.
OPERA NEWS - Carmina Catulli, the title of Michael Linton’s song cycle for baritone and piano, is potentially confusing since Catulli Carmina, with the words reversed, is part of Carl Orff’s Trionfo, the triptych of cantatas that famously includes Carmina Burana. Both Linton and Orff set poems by the influential and admired Latin poet Gaius Valerius Catullus, who lived in the first century B.C. Linton, however, virtually ignores Orff’s precedent and offers here a cycle of seventeen songs that burst with bold originality.
ART WORLD - This is a photo of Warhol superstar Ultra Violet (born Isabelle Collin Dufresne), taken late in her life by fellow Warholian John Loring, the famous design director at Tiffany’s
THE NASHVILLE SCENE - The Roman poet Catullus' affair with his mistress Lesbia may not be the greatest love story in the history of Western literature. But it's surely the most human. The 25 poems that the youthful patrician wrote to his older (and married) lover explore every conceivable human emotion. Love, lust, jealousy, rage — it's all there. No wonder these short, lyrical and occasionally vulgar verses have influenced just about every poet (and hopeless romantic) from antiquity to the present.
CLEVELAND CLASSICAL - On Tuesday, May 24, French baritone Edwin Crossley-Mercer and pianist Jason Paul Peterson opened the 2016 edition of the Baldwin Wallace Art Song Festival with a recital in Gamble Auditorium. Now in its 30th year, the week-long festival, which focuses on the combination of solo singer and piano, is the brainchild of retired Cleveland Institute of Music voice professor George Vassos.
FORUM OPERA - Composer aujourd’hui des mélodies en latin, est-ce bien raisonnable ? Carl Orff avait déjà mis en musique en 1943 certains des 116 poèmes de Catulle, sous le titre de Catulli Carmina, et c’est sans doute à cause de lui que le présent cycle s’intitule Carmina Catulli, pour tâcher d’éviter les confusions.
USA TODAY - Even though Andy Warhol has been gone for more than a quarter-century, we're still unearthing bits of his life. This week an album was released that includes conversations between Ultra Violet, a former Factory "superstar" and muse of Salvador Dali, and Warhol.