Upcoming Events
Friday, January 13th, 2012 at 8:00 pm
Marsh Room, Harvard Musical Association, Cambridge MA
Hosted by the Harvard Musical Association, Florestan presents selected songs from the HMA archive collection of early 20th-century American composers. With baritone Aaron Engebreth, soprano Sarah Pelletier, and pianist Alison d'Amato.
The program includes songs from early 20th-century Harvard composers, including John Alden Carpenter, Amy Beach, George Chadwick, and Horatio Parker, among several others. To end the program, Florestan will present scenes from John Knowles Paine’s grand opera Azara. Those in attendance will be immersed in romantic Americana with these virtually unheard gems.
Saturday, January 14th, 2012, at 7:30 pm
Newburyport Chamber Music Festival
St. Paul's Church, 166 High St., Newburyport MA
In collaboration with American Century Music, Florestan co-directors Aaron Engebreth and Alison d'Amato perform songs and chamber music by early 20th-century composers.
The program includes John Alden Carpenter’s song cycle Gitanjali (text by Rabinadrath Tagore) alongside Frederick Converse’s Sonata for Cello and Piano and Arthur Foote’s Piano Trio No. 2. The acclaimed group of artists is cellist Rafael Popper-Kaiser, violinist Gabriela Diaz, baritone Aaron Engebreth, and pianist Alison d’Amato. A pre-concert lecture will be held at 7:00pm and the concert takes place at St. Paul’s Church, 166 High Street, Newburyport, MA.
Tickets $20 General Admission; $10 Students/Seniors
At the door or www.americancenturymusic.org
Sunday, September 2, 2012
Fredericks Collection, Ashburnham MA
Florestan co-directors Aaron Engebreth and Alison d'Amato present a program of art song on the collection's historic pianos. Program will include Schumann's Dichterliebe, more details in spring 2012.
Recent Past Events
More Past Seasons and Programs>>
November 9, 2011
Hatch recital hall, Eastman School of Music
A program of song, poetry, and discussion with Florestan Recital Project:
Four musical settings of Langston Hughes’s “Harlem,” presented in an interactive format of active discussion between performers and audience about the poem and its musical interpretations. In partnership with Wordsong.
“The Poet’s Love”
August 5 & 6, 12 & 13
A world premiere ballet to Schumann’s masterpiece, Dichterliebe,
with original choreography by Linda MacArthur Miele.
Aaron Engebreth, baritone; Alison d’Amato, pianist
Maine State Ballet Theatre (Falmouth, Maine)
All shows at 7pm
Tickets $20 Adults; $15 Seniors & Children
Reservations www.mainestateballet.org or 207-781-3587
Florestan is pleased to partner with WordSong, a new concert format in which one text is presented in multiple, newly composed settings and is the focus of directed conversation among composers, performers, and listeners. This format can be applied to various venues, from nouveau salons to educational forums to public concerts. WordSong’s goal is to reconnect musicians and audiences through shared, active artistic experiences. It is a public conversation about intuitive musical understanding.
March 13, 2011
WordSong's Forum V, setting Wallace Stevens's Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock with settings by Tom Schnauber, Howard Frazin, Nick Vines, and Felicia Sandler.
For more details about times and locations, please visit www.wordsongboston.org.
Feb 18-19, 2011
Residency with the Ethos New Music Society at the State University of New York at Fredonia,
featuring new works by
student composers and The Strange Case of DR. H. H. Holmes by Libby Larsen (2010 Florestan commission).
BarberFest in Bulgaria!
A collaboration with The American and Bulgarian Music Festival in
Sofia, Bulgaria
In 2009, Florestan Recital Project was granted access to the unpublished songs of Samuel Barber held in the U.S. Library of Congress. With the permission of Barber's estate and the careful assistance of the LOC staff, Florestan took digital photos of each manuscript, as the pages themselves are too fragile to be photocopied. These songs, unheard since Barber’s childhood and student days, became part of BarberFest: The Complete Songs of Samuel Barber, which was first presented at Tufts University's stunning Distler Recital Hall in September of 2009. Florestan is now presenting these unpublished songs throughout North America and abroad.
Entrusting these songs to the dedicated artistry of soprano Susan Brownfield and pianist Daniela Dikova, Florestan is proud to partner with the AmBul Festival.
For more information on this exciting collaboration, please visit the American and Bulgarian Music Festival website at www.ambulfestival.com
The Landscape of American Song: Vanguard Festival 2010
March 4-7, 2010
Dickinson College (Carlisle, PA)
Florestan toasts its final year of residency at Dickinson College with a four-day feast of contemporary American songs. Together with composer Libby Larsen and other guest artists, Florestan will explore the myriad styles and influences that shape today’s American song repertoire, and celebrate the collaborations between performers, poets, and composers that drive its evolution. In addition to works by major and emerging composers, the festival will feature world premiere performances of four song cycles commissioned by Florestan: works by American composers Libby Larsen, Stephen Paulus, and Robert Pound, as well as Poets in Love, a new 30-minute song cycle for tenor, baritone, and four-hand piano composed for Florestan by the renowned composer Thea Musgrave.
View the Vanguard programs >>
Florestan Recital Project, Dickinson College Musical Artists in Residence, presents:
An Evening of Vocal Chamber Music
Sunday, November 8, 2009 at 4:00 pm
Joe Dan Harper, tenor; Anne Kissel, piano;
Guest artists from the Dickinson College Music Faculty
Rubendall Recital Hall, Dickinson College (Carlisle, PA)
Florestan Recital Project ventures beyond the piano to celebrate the world of song with Dickinson College’s own outstanding music faculty. This program presents vocal works with string quartet, violin, horn, and even Benjamin Britten’s magical fabrication of the voice of God! Featuring Britten’s Canticle I (Abraham and Isaac) and Canticle II (Still Falls the Rain),Vaughan Williams’s On Wenlock Edge, and Three Wedding Songs for tenor and violin by American composer Robert Deemer.
Florestan Recital Project, Dickinson College Musical Artists in Residence, presents:
The Creatures’ Choir
Friday, October 2, 2009 at 7:00 pm
Jessica Bowers, mezzo-soprano; John McDonald, composer/pianist.
Rubendall Recital Hall, Dickinson College (Carlisle, PA)
Commissioned in 2007 by Florestan, pianist/composer John McDonald’s elegant evening-length song cycle portrays 26 poems by Carmen Bernos de Gasztold in magnificent English translations by Rumer Godden. McDonald set 20 poetic letters from a menagerie of animals to God; six other beasts are represented by solo piano interludes. From "The Gnat" to "The Snail" to "The Whale," McDonald's songs and interludes illuminate the "miniscule shy active life of country creatures." McDonald is joined by his original partner on the piece and longtime Florestan artist, mezzo-soprano Jessica Bowers.
Florestan Recital Project in partnership with the
Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP) presents:
BarberFest
September 25-27, 2009
Distler Performance Hall, Tufts University (Medford, MA)
Florestan's next Boston event promises to be one of the most exciting ever! Florestan presents BarberFest: The Complete Songs of Samuel Barber within a week-long festival of American music in collaboration with Boston Modern Orchestra Project under the direction of Gil Rose. The festival will take place at Tufts University's beautiful new Distler Recital Hall this coming September. In addition to Barber’s published songs, we will present many of his previously unheard unpublished songs, which were obtained by special permission from the U.S. Library of Congress and Barber’s estate. Artists include Sarah Pelletier, soprano; Shadi Ebrahimi, soprano; Janna Baty, mezzo soprano; Joe Dan Harper, tenor; and Aaron Engebreth, baritone; with pianists Sheila Kibbe, John McDonald, Linda Osborn-Blaschke, Alison d’Amato, and Anne Kissel.
View the BarberFest programs >>