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Pizzetti: I Pastori
Born in Parma in 1880, Ildebrando Pizzetti had a career as musicologist, teacher and composer of music ranging from concerti to film scores. In this beautiful poem by Gabriele D’Annunzio, the narrator fondly remembers his days as a shepherd and the journey his crew would take every fall from the mountains down to the Adriatic Coast.
Lin-Manuel Miranda: Helpless/Satisfied
When I was invited to write this week’s Song of the Day blog, I knew I wanted to include something from Hamilton, but I’ve been struggling with what to feature. I waited to listen to the soundtrack until I saw the show because I wanted to experience Hamilton the first time like a piece of theatre. Therefore, I’m not going to feature a song today that pertains to the main plot of the show (I’m saving those surprises for you!)
Sondheim: Finishing the Hat
Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Pulitzer Prize-winning musical Sunday In the Park with George opened on Broadway in 1984 starring Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters. Act One centers around Georges Seurat as he paints his pointillistic masterpiece, Un dimanche après-midi à l’Île de la Grande Jatte, which was unveiled exactly one-hundred years before the musical premiered.
Schubert: Abendstern
To start off my week of blogs, I wanted to feature the first song I ever sang for Maestro Blier. This somber poem by Johann Mayrhofer asks the prettiest star in the sky why it stays secluded, not joining the other stars around him. The star replies that it is because all the other stars don’t want the kind of love he has to offer and, no matter how hard he tries, they will never accept him.
Phil Kline: Been to Hell
…He culled them to create seven Zippo Songs, from the very moving to the raunchy. Throughout is Theo Bleckmann’s spare vibrato-less voice, like a ghost, or an angel. WNYC’s John Schaefer wrote that in these songs, “Kline channels both Franz Schubert and Jim Morrison” in “a psychedelic haze of love, loss, lust, drugs, war and more drugs.”
Purcell: When I Am Laid In Earth
Lorraine Hunt. I have NYFOS (and Michael Barrett, who programmed the 92nd Street Y and presented Lorraine’s NY recital debut in the mid-90’s) to thank for introducing me to Lorraine.
Sondheim: Epiphany from Sweeney Todd
I’m a huge Sondheim fan. When I was 12, my father took me to a preview on Broadway of Sweeney Todd starring Len Cariou and Angela Lansbury. He told me this was a new musical by Sondheim and that it was a masterpiece—Sondheim’s best yet.
Handel: “Amor e qual vento” from Orlando
Last year I had the pleasure of working with the young opera director RB Schlather and his ingenious storefront Handel opera trilogy at Whitebox Gallery just off the Bowery. The whole experience was unlike anything I had witnessed in the music world. It was something I will never forget—and I don’t think my 8yo daughter will either.
Carl Loewe: Erlkönig
It’s January 1996 at the 92nd Street Y in NYC. The great German baritone Hermann Prey is rehearsing a recital devoted entirely to songs by Carl Loewe (just weeks before The Schubertiade, the celebrated 10-year examination of Schubert’s works, which Prey had masterminded since 1987). I’m a young music publicist at the Y and completely enthralled by the animated 6-foot tall Prey and his voice, which could go from ferocity to gentle and vulnerable—and back again. (Prey’s voice was so unique—I’ve never heard anything like it since).
Mascagni: Oh, come al tuo sottile corpo s’aggira
Today’s entry is from NYFOS@Juilliard cast member Gerard Schneider. Today, I...
Sam Cooke and the Soul Stirrers: Come, Let Us Go Back to God
Today’s entry is from NYFOS@Juilliard cast member Samuel Levine. In art, as in...
Paul McCartney: Junk
Today’s entry is from NYFOS@Juilliard cast member Gerard Schneider. The song I...
Gabriel Kahane: Bradbury (304 Broadway)
Today’s entry is from NYFOS@Juilliard cast member and pianist Christopher...
Alabama Shakes: Joe
Today’s entry is from NYFOS@Juilliard cast member Kelsey Lauritano. More so a...
Prince: Purple Rain
When an icon passes there is the unavoidable sharing of their creations and outward expressions of nostalgia from fans across borders. In the 21st Century we share in the profound grief that fans face beyond word of mouth and radio broadcast but even more profoundly through social media, sources that allow us to recall or experience for the first time the insurmountable joy fans received from an artist’s work. As I scrolled through Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter and every other site this week I was faced with post after post of the gut wrenching truth that the world lost yet another an icon, one who’s influence went far beyond the boundaries of their craft and challenged preconceived notions about not only music, but style, race, and sexuality: this irreplaceable genius was Prince.