Deen Larsen: Another Side of Elly

erikaswitzer@gmail.com (Erika) — Thu, 02 May 2013 15:47:17 GMT

Deen Larsen’s extraordinary words stop me in my tracks. My tracks, so often hasty and restless, at first resist the meditative depth of his thoughts, but then, slowing out of curiousity, welcome the provocation. Thank you, Deen, for...

Richard Turp: Emerging from a Shadow

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Wed, 21 Nov 2012 19:00:03 GMT

The recent passing of Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau set me thinking about not only his overall legacy but more specifically his influence on the present generation of lieder singers. It is difficult to accurately evaluate his legacy partly because his death is so recent and because...

Emily Ezust:Thoughts on the gentle art of translating Art Song texts

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Mon, 05 Nov 2012 16:10:06 GMT

How do I translate thee? Let me count the ways.

"Poetry is what is lost in translation."

--Robert Frost

It can be disappointing to open an art song recital program and find

no translations inside, especially...

Terence Dawson: Collaborative Piano and the developing Musician

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Sat, 20 Oct 2012 02:44:19 GMT

In the context of piano study, the term collaborative pianist could imply that a pianist who plays chamber music avoids discussing or even performing the solo repertoire, thereby delegating them to a secondary role.

Most certainly, the study of all genres of music is necessary to avoid gaps in a student’s musical development...

Artist Profile: Julius Drake

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Mon, 08 Oct 2012 03:33:19 GMT

Stats: Collaborative Pianist, lives in London

Next recitals: Zurich, Vienna, Madrid, Florence

Erika Switzer spoke to Julius Drake in June 2012 over the phone as he was preparing for a series of concerts with his frequent musical partner Gerald Finley, and his interview follows:

J: I’ve just been rehearsing with Gerry (Finley).

E: How’s it coming together?

J: Fine. We were rehearsing Winterreise, we’re about to...

Spencer Myer: Making the piano sing

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Sat, 06 Oct 2012 00:48:48 GMT

Pianists face an ongoing challenge: to make the piano sound like a singer. As the piano is a percussion instrument, whereby a hammer hits a string to make sound, the tone created by a pianist each time a finger strikes a key begins to...

Rebecca Ringle: Live performance as a birthright - Interview and Tedx Video

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 15:57:50 GMT

Editors Note: One of my great friends and colleagues Kristofer Johnson (conductor for the Concord Chorale in New Hampshire) turned me on to Rebecca's video for TEDx a few months back. We immediately contacted Rebecca to see if she would do an interview, since the video was so moving. The interview questions and answers definitely work better if you have seen the video, so we are also embedding it for you here. Enjoy!

Susan Platts: Mentoring with Jessye Norman

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Fri, 31 Aug 2012 18:12:22 GMT

The Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative pairs extraordinarily accomplished artists with emerging artists in a mentoring/protégé relationship. There are six disciplines in this program: Art, Theatre, Music, Writing, Film and Dance. In 2003, I was invited by Rolex to submit an application for

Laura Loewen: A love affair with Diction

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 18:13:39 GMT

For as long as I can remember I have been fascinated by the power of words. Books have enriched my life in many ways; they allow me to experience different times and places, to participate vicariously in other people’s lives, and through the empathy I feel for characters in the books, to gain insight into my own experience as a human. So it is natural that...

Jocelyn Dueck: Language in Song; Song in Language

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 17:42:12 GMT

In this age of instant information, answers to questions seem immediate. It is not uncommon for me, when I am faced with the occasional memory lapse during class, to hear a student say, ‘Just a minute’, whip out her smart phone, and track down the answer in a matter of seconds. It’s enough to make the most ...

François LeRoux: French Diction for Singers

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Sat, 02 Jun 2012 18:20:34 GMT

Details or essentials ?

For non-French singers, the difficulties in singing French correctly can be easy to explain. The issues are: French has more vowels than many other languages, especially English, with some peculiar nasal vowels. Liaisons are ...

JOHN GREER:FOR THE LOVE OF FOLK SONG

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Wed, 02 May 2012 16:30:05 GMT

I was blessed to grow up in a country that was justifiably proud of its cultural heritage and in a school system in which the study of music was an important part of the curriculum. My earliest memories of community music-making were in these elementary school music classes, and my love of Canadian folk song began there. Edith Fulton Fowke’s first volume of Songs of Canada (co-edited with Richard Johnson) became

Liz Upchurch: Memories of Martin Isepp

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Fri, 06 Apr 2012 16:32:48 GMT

As a musician I have been blessed in my life with incredible teachers who have inspired and guided me. However, the most extraordinary mentor I’ve had in my life was Martin Isepp. As a young pianist in the 80’s studying at the Royal Academy of Music my aspirations were in solo and chamber music

Taylor Stoehr: Paul Goodman and What Sparks and WIry Cries

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Sat, 03 Mar 2012 16:36:53 GMT

What sparks and wiry cries shall I

strike first upon the iron strings?

for I have got a pick of flint

and I have learnt a skirl of glee.

Stephen Ralls & bruce Ubukata: Thirty Years of the Aldeburgh Connection

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 16:43:01 GMT

“What’s the Connection?” many of you may be asking. Well, we can start the story in July 1977, when a young and enthusiastic Canadian pianist was paying his first visit to the summer school of music that Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears had founded in connection with their flourishing Aldeburgh Festival. The young musician thought he had arrived as an observer to sit in on masterclasses. Instead, he found himself filling a last minute vacancy as an accompanist - and, in the process, Bruce Ubukata met another staff pianist, Stephen Ralls. The rest, as they say, is history.

Richard Turp: In Defense of a Tradition

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 16:37:53 GMT

I often feel that I’m fortunate to have been born (though not raised) in Montréal. I returned to my hometown some 27 years ago after two decades spent in Europe, primarily in the UK. I love the scale, the ambiance, the joie de vivre of Montreal. Best of all, I love its duality: a francophone city within an Anglophone context and continent. At its most winning, Montreal is a fusion of European, primarily French culture and elegance, and North American energy and enterprise.

François Le Roux: The Poulenc Academy- Bienvenue!

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Sun, 05 Feb 2012 16:44:58 GMT

As a student, in love with poetry and the art of recital, I never attended a master class session that offered a complete work-up on every aspect of what the French Art Song (or mélodie) repertoire is made. At last, and in full activity as a singer, I decided that I would, as soon as possible, found an Academy which would fulfill what I was looking for: The Académie Francis Poulenc in Tours, now 15 years old, is trying to achieve exactly that.

Jocelyn Morlock: Composing for Competitions

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 16:47:19 GMT

I have written the imposed songs for vocal competitions twice – first, for the Montreal International Music Competition in 2005, and later for the Eckhardt-Gramatté Competition in 2008. In both cases, the most difficult thing I found was to try to write challenging but idiomatic music for all vocal types at once, that would show off the strengths (and expose any weaknesses) of many different singers. This was truly daunting – of course different transpositions are made for the various voice types but as we know there is more difference between singers than just their available range of notes.

Graham Johnson: The Songmakers' Almanac Returns

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:52:46 GMT

Thirty-five years ago, four singers and I came together to present concerts under the banner of The Songmakers’ Almanac. ‘Makers’ of songs were taken to be composers and their poets, and further down the production line, singers and their pianists. The leaflet advertising the first series promised “a song-anthology come-to-life, a flexible singing repertory group which aims to celebrate anniversaries, outstanding events, and special subjects in unusual programmes which will depart from the long-established song-recital format.” Gerald Moore, Eric Sams and Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau were patrons. Felicity Lott and Richard Jackson, soprano and baritone of the new group, gave the inaugural recital, Our Pleasant Vices, at the Purcell Room, South Bank, on 4 October 1976.

Elly Ameling: The Art of the Song

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:51:17 GMT

Art Song, did I choose it? – or was I chosen by it. Well, I think the latter. No wonder, knowing that my dear Mother sang to me from the moment I was born. Soon we sang together and she was such a proud mother that to her it was obvious that I should sing the highest part! Her beautiful voice kept vibrating in me all my life, unconsciously I think.

Laura Loewen: Health and the Collaborative Pianist

sparksandwirycries@gmail.com (editor) — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:49:00 GMT

I spent the first 35 years of my life practicing – of course I found time for wine and food and traveling, but there was certainly no time for any significant exercise. I had brief flings with ill-fated aerobics and dance classes in my Undergrad and Grad degrees, but they always ended up in some sort of disaster. I got through the countless hours of practicing during my DMA in Collaborative Piano without any real exercise, and, sore and fairly tight, started a year in the training program at Minnesota Opera.

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