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From:  Karen Mercedes <dalila@R...>
Karen Mercedes <dalila@R...>
Date:  Thu Dec 28, 2000  11:21 pm
Subject:  Re: [vocalist-temporary] REP: English contemporary


On Thu, 28 Dec 2000 LYNDA313@a... wrote:

> My daughter is searching for a set of songs to include on her senior
> (conservatory) recital. She needs English language songs, plus needs some
> length (therefore a set, rather than a single piece), and these songs must
> have been written in the last 40 years. She is a lyric soprano with a good
> high C and a clear middle and lower register, as well, and would like to find
> something unique...not TOO dark a text.
>
> Any of you rep gods and goddesses (Karen, are you there?) , I'd love to hear
> from you, as well as anyone who's just performed or taught something that
> might fill the bill.


My #1 vote for a recital closer for soprano is:

Seymour Barab: "Parodies - as some traditional jump-rope rhymes might have
been set to music by the masters" (Boosey & Hawkes). This cycle is
hilarious. It includes:
"I never go to Macy's" in the style of Handel
"Miss Lucy" in the style of Donizetti
"I was standing on the corner" in the style of Wolf
"Poor old lady" in the style of Mussorgsky
"Charlie Chaplin" in the style of Duparc
"Spanish dancer" in the style of de Falla

If this kind ofthing doesn't seem "right" for a serious recital (Is
there anything more deadly than a "serious" recital?), here are some other
suggestions:

William Alwyn: Invocations (A. Lengnick)

Jack Beeson: From a Watchtower (Boosey & Hawkes)

Gordon Binkerd: Four Songs for High Soprano (Boosey & Hawkes)

Gordon Binkerd: Shut Out That Moon (texts by Thomas Hardy; Boosey &
Hawkes)

Howard Boatwright: Six Prayers of Kierkegaard (Walnut Grove Press)

William Bolcom: Briefly it Enters (texts by Jane Kenyon; E.B. Marks/Hal
Leonard)

Geoffrey Bush: Five Spring Songs (Novello)

Ned Rorem: The Nantucket Songs (Boosey & Hawkes)

Ned Rorem: Women's Voices (Boosey & Hawkes)

Ned Rorem: Six Songs for High Voice (C.F. Peters)

Arthur Bliss: Angels of the Mind (Novello)

Nicola LeFanu: A Penny for a Song (Novello)

Judith Weir: Scotch Minstrelsy (Novello)

Samuel Barber: Despite and Still, op. 41 (G. Schirmer)

Gian Carlo Menotti: Five Songs for Voice and Piano (G. Schirmer/Hal
Leonard)

Thomas Pasatieri: Day of Love (G. Schirmer)

Richard Danielpour: Spirits in the Well (text by Toni Morrison; American
Musical Publishers)

Aaron Jay Kernis: Songs of Innocents, Book I or Book II (G. Schirmer)

Lee Hoiby: Night Songs (texts by Adelaide Crapsey; Classical Vocal
Repertoire)

John Corigliano: The Cloisters (G. Schirmer)

Kirke Mechem: To an Absent Love, op. 58 (G. Schirmer)



Slightly shorter, but intriguing:

Andre Previn: Sallie Chisum Remembers Billy the Kid (G. Schirmer)




If she changes her mind and DOES want some really depressing songs, try:

Aribert Reimann: Six Poems by Sylvia Plath (Schott)



Because I am a nice person, I will not suggest anything by Milton Babbitt,
George Crumb, or Elliott Carter. :)

KM
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