Graduate recital in voice

Includes recorded audio files in WAV and MP3 formats, 52:47 in length.The vocal literature for this program has been selected in order\ud to demonstrate technical ability, interpretive expression, and\ud knowledge of the stylistic demands of the Baroque, Romantic, and Post-\ud Romantic periods in which the music was written.\ud The opening work, Cantata No. 84, composed by Johann Sebastian\ud Bach in 1731, is based on a text by Picander, a well-known Leipzig\ud poet. To express the joyful mood of the text in the alternating\ud da capo arias and secco recitativo, Bach makes use of strong rhythmic\ud patterns. The vocal line and instrumental lines are both richly ornamented.\ud Through his use of polyphony, word painting, and coloratura,\ud Bach has interwoven the words and music to create this work of enduring\ud beauty. \ud The three songs by Claude Debussy reveal the ever-changing beauty\ud of the sea in its contrasting moods of calm, agitation, and majesty.\ud This is effected primarily in the piano accompaniment by shimmering\ud tremulos and broken or rolling arpeggios, based upon whole-tone scales.\ud The Tonadillos, by Enrique Granados, depict widely contrasting\ud emotions of a Madrid woman for her "majo," including love, jealousy,\ud rejection, teasing coquettry, and final desolation at his death. The\ud piano accompaniment provides characteristic Spanish rhythms, often\ud suggesting the sound of guitars or castanets.\ud Gustave Mahler's songs, set to the poetry of Friedrich Ruckert,\ud evoke such differing sensations as the buzzing of bees making honey in\ud the hive, the fragrance of the lime tree, the feeling of complete\ud detachment from the world's cares, and tho tolling of the bell at\ud midnight waking. Mahler creates these effects by soaring vocal lines,\ud patterns based on scale segments in the accompaniment, and frequent\ud shifts in time signatures and tonality. The group ends in a triumphant\ud climax with the assurance that man is not alone in his midnight vigil\ud for God is standing watch with him