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Songfire to ignite venues
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BREAKING NEWS: VANCOUVERSUN.COM I THURSDAY, MAY 31, 201:f
Art-song festival showcases new works by contemporary composers and established repertoire BY DAVID GORDON DUKE
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of artist Liberia Marcuzzi, images of which will be projected during the performance. B.C. composers, including Imant Raminsh and David MacIntyre, are featured June 10 at West Van couver United Church, an event focused on ensemble music with guests EnChor. The single biggest name in this year's SongFire is Thomas Allen, in recital with pianist Joseph Middleton at the Chan Centre on June 13 with a program heavy on English repertoire. SongFire pays affectionate trib ute to the late Harold Brown, a legendary Vancouver-based col laborative pianist, June 19 at the Vancouver Unitarian Church. VISI stalwarts baritone Tyler Duncan and pianist Erika Swit zer (the latter recently awarded her doctorate from Juilliard) perform works by Samuel Bar ber, Oscar Morawetz and Lloyd Burritt. Debussy Birthday Salon will be presented June 22, an evening focused on the music of Claude Debussy, and a sequel to last year's Schubertiad. Here the idea is context: not exactly, or only, a concert, but rather an experience summoning the whole ambience of fin-de-siecle Paris. Finally, on June 24, will be the latest instalment of a virtual VISI invention: Song Theatre, which marries song and narra tive in interesting ways. Brenda Sparks's original script Sea worthy and Thomas Pasatieri's Lady Macbeth will be presented in Granville Island's Waterfront Theatre. This is by no means all. At the University of B.C. there are not just concerts, but series of con certs. Post-lunchtime events are organized around themes (for example, June 18, Uncon ditional Love explores the idea of songs about parenthood); five other concerts showcase emerg ing artists.
e could quibble �bout whether SongFire - the performance arm of the annual Vancouver International Song Institute - should be con sidered the last event of our spring classical music season or the start of our summer festivals. What matters is that concert venues will erupt in a celebration of songs and singing. Even the most dedicated sup porters once debated whether such an extensive program, devoted to one of the harder-to sell branches of classical reper toire, could ever take root. That the art-song event is in its sixth year should provide a sense of relief as well as satisfaction. Composer Lloyd Burritt has served on the VISI board for four years and explained how things have changed. "Everything has taken shape, all from [founding artistic director] Rena Sharon. It's unfolded magically this year; VISI is growing by leaps and bounds." VISI goes far beyond concerts and classes. Burritt describes · how more local composers are featured in SongFire programs, which encourages compos ers and writers to create fresh repertoire. Burritt has three works on tap this year, including a new song cycle. Knowing the performers he's writing for as people is one of the reasons he's so enthusias tic about the project: connections have been forged over the years, and now it's dividend time. From the beginning, VISI set out to be a "no-stars" proposi tion: distinguished veterans mix and mingle with youngsters just starting. Things kick off June 8 with Play ing with Fire. The new Orpheum Annex is the venue for an evening of works from VISI's Song Lab project, which mates contempo Special to The Sun rary composers and poets. The emphasis stays local June 9 with Here and Now, a showcase for works by some of our more established vocal composers, At a glance including the premiere of Bur VANCOUVER INTERNATIONAL ritt's Triptych: Three Songs on SONG INSTITUTE Three Abstract Paintings. The Information: For an overview, idea is multi-disciplinary: Bur including lectures, classes, and the ritt has made musical settings complete SongFire schedule, go to of texts by poet Marilyn Lerch, www.songinstitute.ca. which we�e inspired by paintings
Baritone Thomas Allen appears June 13 in a showcase concert for SongFire at the Chan Centre.
Baritone's story inspired creators of Billy Elliot Thomas Allen is not exactly Billy Elliot, the title character of Lee Hall's hit film and subsequent stage musical, who escaped a strike-torn mining village to become a profes sional ballet dancer. "Billy" is fiction; but, as playwright Hall admits, aspects of his story were taken from the renowned opera knight's real-life ascent to stardom. Allen makes his first Vancouver appearance June 13. Allen comes from the English work ing class, and his saga is one of talent blossoming from unprepos sessing northern England roots. The moral: talent, work, persever-
ance, and more work can make for a splendid career as singer, director, and recent Chancellor of Durham University. Allen is prepared to give his opin ions about the musical scene with northern bluntness. He's passion ate about the idea of opportu nity and a believer in the implicit meritocracy of talent. He's no fan of dumbing down in the guise of popularizing, and has no patience with commercial ploys to debase art. At the Royal Philharmonic Society Music Awards a decade ago, he declared: "We kowtow more to the mass appeal that
seems to be the order of the day. We have undoubtedly become a civilization in rapid cultural decline:' Allen appears in a showcase concert for SongFire at the Chan Centre. Although Allen's greatest claim to fame is his way with many of opera's great baritone roles, he's no slouch where lieder is con cerned. His program features the requisite Schubert and Beethoven but is otherwise heavy on English repertoire, including Purcell, Butterworth, Quilter, and folk songs from Northumbria. - David Gordon Duke, Special to The Sun