Graduate recital in voice : love's eternal light

Includes recorded audio files in WAV and MP3 formats, 44:91 in lengthThroughout the recital, light is used symbolically to represent love, love's purity, joy and hope. The recital takes the audience on an emotional journey from the discovery of the light, to fearing that it will not last forever, to the realization that for better or worse love's light stays with one indefinitely even after its physical presence has ceased. The program is comprised of the German lied, the French melodie, American and British song, an Aria and Spirituals and includes works by several of the most prolific composers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Each composer placed utmost importance on communicating the text through powerful accompaniments and the accompaniments play an equal role to that of the vocal line. Because many of the songs included in the program have been orchestrated, the repertoire is congenial for the operatic voice. Opening the recital is "Strings in the Earth and Air," by American song composer Richard Hundley with prose by the influential Irish novelist and poet, James Joyce. This lyrical song is carried by the melody in the vocal line which is often doubled in the accompaniment. An A, B, A(1) form is used and is tied together by an introduction and two short interludes between each section that all contain variations of the melody found in the A section. British composer Roger Quilter's beloved song "Music, When Soft Voices Die," is set to a poem of the same name by the English Romantic poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley. Much like the previous song, the melody dominates and is used in the accompaniment to reinforce the text. The climax of the piece "And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone, love itself shall slumber on" ends with the beginning of the postlude that implements the music that was heard in the first line of text, "Music, when soft voices die, vibrates in the memory" tying the two themes together. The final song in the first set, "Where the Music Comes From," was composed by and the text written by Lee Hoiby. This is one of Hoiby's most famous songs and has the feel of a popular song. Three varied strophic stanzas are set much like pop tunes with each stanza modulating to a higher key which sustains a sense of excitement and captures the attention of the audience. With a light air this song concludes the set with a theme of growth in love. (See more intext.