A VOCAL TRIUMPH AT JUILLIARD

 Marianna Vartikian and Kimberly Alexandra Adam

We generally review concerts at the request of the artist, the producing institution, or the publicist. Sometimes we long to go to a concert or recital for our own pleasure or out of curiosity. Last night, we casually dropped by Juilliard to see and hear more of a singer whom we heard very briefly at the Classic Lyric Arts Gala. We had no intention of writing a review but how could we not when we were so impressed and wanted so much to share with our dear Readers.

To hear "Song to the Moon" from  Antonin Dvorák's Rusalka is always a treat but to hear it actually performed was transporting. So artistic was the interpretation by soprano Kimberly Alexandra Adam that we could see the moonlight, the rays of which, according to the movement of the artist's eyes, were temporarily obscured by clouds, causing her glance to search the heavens. We felt the longing in our chest. We forgot we were in an auditorium in Juilliard. And Dear Reader, that is art--something that goes beyond a gorgeous round sound and astute phrasing.

All of Ms. Adam's selections were related to the moon and included Fauré's "Clair de lune" and Bellini's charming "Vaga luna" with its interesting contrast of legato and staccato. Schubert's "An den Mond" involved some arpeggios in the piano, beautifully rendered by Marianna Vartikian, which reminded us of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata.

Lugo's expressive singing was accompanied by Olivia Tilley, the two voices joining in exquisite harmony.

The fairytale of the rose and the nightingale has inspired other works, mainly a short story by Oscar Wilde and a stunning song written by Rimsky-Korsakov in 1866 in which the soprano has a similarly gorgeous melody to sing. Someday we hope to hear them side by side.

Lending credence to our belief that the best of Broadway music represents 20th century American opera, Ms. Lugo gave  a warm romantic tone to "Till There Was You" from Meredith Wilson's The Music Man, so much more listenable than abstract academic music of the period.

Two contemporary pieces rounded out the program. Osvaldo Golijov's "Lúa descolorida" sung in its Galician dialect and  Eric Whitacre's "Goodnight Moon" with its surreal but amusingly rhymed text by Margaret Wise Brown. Ms. Adams is an artist to watch. Still a junior at Juilliard, we foresee a grand career. 

Another soprano on the program also made a fine impression. Dalila Lugo opened the program with a stunning vocalise by Saint-Saens, "Le Rossignol et la rose" from Parysatis--incidental music composed for a play at the turn of the 20th century. Regular readers will recall our affection for the harp, and here Ms.

Aside from the Saint-Saëns vocalise, our favorite piece  was "Canción de Paloma" sung by the aspiring opera singer heroine of Francisco Asenjo Barbieri's El barberillo de Lavapiés, a zarzuela we heard once downtown a few years ago. Ms. Lugo captured the high spirited self-confidence of the winning heroine and her accompanist Rodrigo Garcia Vargas captured the rhythms and moods of zarzuela, one of our favorite musical art forms.

It was a lovely evening of moonlight and birds singing. We walked home with a lighter step than we entered with. Good music will do that for you!

© meche kroop

 

CLASSIC LYRIC ARTS GALA

 

CLASSIC LYRIC ARTS SINGERS

Although we enjoy Classic Lyric Arts students in small private concerts, it is at the yearly gala that one can see and hear a larger group of vocal and collaborative piano students of their three summer programs and also more advanced students of Classic Lyric Art Vocal Academy (CLAVA), a year round venture. It seems odd calling them students when their performances rival those with well-established careers. Many of them have been cast in operas and fortunate are the companies that hire them. The word "students" is somewhat misleading, but if you are familiar with the world of opera, you know that singers are always studying, even the most famous ones.

It is always such a treat to spend an evening seeing the results of their training. The students don't just sing, they present operatic scenes, staged and directed by faculty member Daniel Isengart. Attendees are treated to a sumptuous buffet before and after the performance and have an opportunity to mingle with the artists and to get to know them.  But the important thing is the singing so let us move on.

We will not be able to mention everyone who sang but we would like to share some of the highlights. One of our very favorite duets for tenor and baritone is the famous "Dio che nell'alma infondere" from Verdi's Don Carlo. Tenor David Freides, whom we recently heard as Rodolfo in Puccini's La Bohême, showed a heavier part of his voice as Don Carlo  and baritone Enes Pektas, recently starring as Michele in Puccini's Il Tabarro did the same for his role as  the Marquis de Posa. It is so gratifying to see young singers stretching their voices. They gave us intense dramatics as well as fine singing. Excellent accompaniment was by Marianna Vartikian.

Ms. Vartikian somehow managed to create a fine simulation of a Strauss orchestra as Laura Soto-Bayomi, Estelina Syla, and Sophia Durante enacted the heart-breaking scene from Der Rosenkavalier in which The Marschallin (LSB) steps back and watches her lover Octavian (SD) falling in love with Sophie (ES).

Soprano Sofia Gotch, a recent prizewinner of the Gloria Gari Competition (as was Mr. Pektas) performed Juliette's "Poison Aria" ("Amour, ranime mon courage") accompanied by Giancarlo Llerena. The voice soared to the ceiling of the concert room of The Kosciuszko Foundation and the overtones bounced all over the room. Furthermore, the acting was most convincing.

Particularly well directed was the scene from Donizetti's L'elisir d'amore in which the naïve Nemorino enlists in the army to get money to buy more love potion. Danny Farah accompanied tenor Wonjin Choi as the gullible Nemorino and baritone Brendon Rapushaj took the role of Sergeant Belcore. 

Accompanied by Mr. Llerena, Kimberly Alexandra Adam and Daisy Dalit Sigal each performed a poem by Tonino Guerra, set by Giovanni Fusco. The works were surprisingly composed in the 20th century, surprising because they were singable. It would seem that anything written in Italian is singable! Both singers shone.

Creating staging for scenes involving a large cast is challenging but Mr. Isengart rose to the challenge and made perfect sense of scenes from Mozart's Cosi fan tutte, Donizetti's Lucia de Lammermoor, and Rossini's Guglielmo Tell. Proof of "making sense" is when one can tell what's going on even without speaking the language.

There were two people in attendance who made perfect sense to us. One is Artistic Director Glenn Morton who introduced the evening by emphasizing the importance of language as taught in countries where the language is spoken with native teachers, and Executive Director John Viscardi who just so happens to be a superfine singer himself, one we reviewed a decade ago! Along with CLA France, CLA Italy, and CLA Vocal Academy, CLA is expanding again, moving CLA Mozart to an exceptional new location in Italy. Bravissimo!

©meche kroop

CLASSIC LYRIC ARTS SUPER-SALON

 Pianists Patrick Gallagher and Marianna Vartikian with singers Enes Pektas, Sophia Durante, 

Sara Stevens and David Freides

It was far more than a private salon that we attended yesterday in a gorgeous Manhattan penthouse. It was a celebration of the first year of Classic Lyric Arts Vocal Academy ( hereafter known as CLAVA) giving a chance to first year attendees to show off the impressive results of their intense post-graduate training. Young opera singers are not always getting the training they need at the conservatories in order to survive in the highly competitive and demanding world of opera. Through CLAVA they will get the rigorous training they need, at a more comprehensive level than the students at CLA summer programs get.

One has only to listen to the results to know that CLAVA is on the right track. Students are learning the repertoire that will get them jobs, not roles in obscure modern works that will never become part of the canon. That they are profiting mightily from this training is obvious. There were moments in the recital when we heard such a fresh connection between the music, the text, and the inner feelings of the character that we had chills, and, at one point, tears. This is what opera really should be!

We cannot describe the entire generous program but we would like to share a few highlights. If we have little to say about technique, it is because we were captivated by the way in which the technique dissolved into the emotions of the character.  No sets! No costumes! Just "acting" coming from such a deep place that the singer dissolved into the character.

Take, for example, the performance of soprano Sara Stevens in "Marietta's Lied" from Korngold's Die Tote Stadt.  We felt all the melancholy, the sehnsucht, the sense of the transitory nature of happiness.  Of course the German was perfekt and the dynamics contributed but our attention was taken by the emotions.

Similarly, soprano Sophia Durante completely inhabited the character of Rosina from Rossini's Il Baribiere di Siviglia, making her adorably spunky by means of lavish, daring, and accurate fioritura, thus illustrating Rosina's willful determination. We just wanted to see her get her way (forgetting, for the moment, the unhappy Countess she becomes in Mozart's Nozze di Figaro).

We haven't heard soprano Yvette Keong in a number of years and we were delighted to witness how she has grown as an artist. The clarity of her diction made every word clear in "My Ship Has Sails" from Kurt Weill's Lady in the Dark. The beautiful text was lent a hint of an unbalanced character that inspired us to look up the plot of this 20th century American opera (unfortunately called a "musical"--but that's just an opinion of ours that regular readers will understand). Indeed, the character is troubled and undergoing psychoanalysis. Could it be just an accident that Ms. Keong conveyed that? We think not.

There were two male artists performing as well, both new to us. Turkish baritone Enes Pektas enacted the clueless Count from Mozart's Nozze di Figaro, wringing from the text every ounce of male piggishness. By what magic can dynamics and phrasing create a character? We wanted to laugh at his pomposity but also felt sorry for him! We found Mr. Pektas to be quite the storyteller.

Tenor David Freides impressed us greatly. with "E lucevan le Stelle" from Puccini's Tosca. We have heard this aria sung by all the great singers of the world and admired their technique and tone but we don't think we have ever felt so invited into a man's heart at the point of his imminent death--the flood of happy memories tinged with the feeling of loss. It was at this point that we became a bit tearful, feeling Mario's depth of character, rather than admiring the overtones.

Not only was the singing first-rate but the piano accompaniment was right on point. Accompanying duties were shared by Glenn Morton, Patrick Gallagher and (new to us) Marianna Vartikian.

What an incredibly special afternoon it was! We not only enjoyed the superlative singing but we feel we learned something about the artistry that is too often neglected, overlooked, or overwhelmed by excessively showy "grandstanding".

© meche kroop