Join us for Cerddorion’s 20th Anniversary Season! Our twentieth season launches Friday, November 14 at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Carroll ERDDORION Gardens, Brooklyn. Our Manhattan concert date will be finalized soon. In March 2015, we will mark our 20th anniversary with a special concert, including the winners VOCAL ENSEMBLE of our third Emerging Composers Competition. The season will conclude with our third concert C late in the spring. Be sure to check www.Cerddorion.org for up-to-date information, and keep an eye out for James John word of our special anniversary gala in the spring! Artistic Director !!! P RESENTS Support Cerddorion Ticket sales cover only a small portion of our ongoing musical and administrative expenses. If you would like to make a tax-deductible contribution, please send a check (payable to Cerddorion NYC, Inc.) to: The Food of Love Cerddorion NYC, Inc. Post Office Box 946, Village Station HAKESPEARE IN SONG New York, NY 10014-0946 S I N C OLLABORATION WITH !!! HE HAKESPEARE OCIETY For further information about Cerddorion Vocal Ensemble, please visit our web site: T S S Michael Sexton, Artistic Director WWW.CERDDORION.ORG Join our mailing list! !!! or Follow us on Twitter: @cerddorionnyc Sunday, June 1 at 3pm Sunday, June 8 at 3pm or St. Paul’s Episcopal Church St. Ignatius of Antioch Like us on Facebook 199 Carroll Street, Brooklyn 87th Street & West End Avenue, Manhattan THE PROGRAM DONORS Our concerts would not be possible without a great deal of financial assistance. Cerddorion would like to Readings presented by Anne Bates and Chukwudi Iwuji, courtesy of The Shakespeare Society thank the following, who have generously provided financial support for our activities over the past year. PATRONS From the Comedies Peter V. Z. Cobb and Nina K. Cobb Cathy Markoff Daedalus Technology Group, Inc. Kathryn Ann McDonald Shakespeare Suite Nancy Wertsch (b. 1948) Linnea Johnson Jonathan Miller It Was a Lover and His Lass Michael Klitsch and Jean Rodie Christopher Ryan Oh Mistress Mine The Levitt Foundation Ellen Schorr Daffodils The Markoff Living Trust Larry Sutter BENEFACTORS Sprits of Another Sort Dr. Gordon Wood Anderson Dean Rainey Reading: “Where should this music be?” (Ferdinand) – The Tempest, Act I, Scene 2 Clare Detko Dale Rejtmar and Gerald Greland Diana Gordon Charles Rodriguez Where Should This Music Be? Christopher Ryan (b. 1968) Joyce Trimble Gwadz Jeanette Rodriguez World Premiere Performances Alice Henkin Anita Ryan Herman B. John Nancy M. Tooney Three Shakespeare Songs Ralph Vaughan Williams Myrna Nachman Mara and Rick Wallace (1872-1958) Full Fathom Five William R. Nye Reading: “Our revels now are ended” (Prospero) –The Tempest, Act IV, Scene 1 FRIENDS William W. Bair Mark Kingstone The Cloud-Capp’d Towers Jeanne Becker Ellen Kunes Over Hill, Over Dale Jude Cobb McGraw Hill Education LLC Wendy Dion Kathleen O'Connell From the Sonnets Phillip Ewell Jennifer Oates Steve Friedman Eleanor Perlman Thy Sweet Love Remember’d Joseph Prestamo (b. 1988) Gingerbread Manor Bed & Breakfast David Ronis Susan Glass Grady Sullivan Reading: “How like a winter hath my absence been” –Sonnet 97 Emily John Jonathan and Edith Weil Jacqueline Jones Gretta Wren How Like a Winter Anna Harmon, soprano; Christopher Ryan, tenor Continued… !!! MATTHEW HARRIS (b. 1956) currently teaches at Brooklyn College, CUNY. His cantata, A Reading: “My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun” –Sonnet 130 Child’s Christmas in Wales, received its German premiere this past season. His a cappella works, such as the award-winning Shakespeare Songs Books I-VI, are performed worldwide and are on numerous My Mistress’ Eyes commercial recordings, including Kantorei of Kansas City’s recently released all-Harris CD, “Music and Sweet Poetry.” His one-act opera, The Mark of Cain, was recently premiered by Chelsea Reading: “When in disgrace with fortune and men’s eyes” –Sonnet 29 Opera, and his three-act Tess was performed in part by New York City Opera and other companies. Awards and grants include two NEA fellowships in composition. Harris lives in New When In Disgrace York City. Among Harris’s most popular works are his six books of Shakespeare songs (1990-2009), comprising some twenty-one choral settings of the Bard’s verses in a variety of styles. The finale of !!!Intermission!!! Book V, When That I Was and a Little Tiny Boy, uses folk-like melodies and open harmonies to set the clown Feste’s epilogue to Twelfth Night, and climaxes in an extended coda that builds to sixteen parts as it repeats various bits of the poem. From the Tragedies & Histories When That I Was and a Little Tiny Boy Twelfth Night – Act V, Scene 1 CLOWN sings Reading: “Gallop apace” (Juliet) – Romeo and Juliet, Act III, Scene 2 When that I was and a little tiny boy, By swaggering could I never thrive, With hey, ho, the wind and the rain, For the rain, & c. A foolish thing was but a toy, But when I came unto my beds, When He Shall Die Steven Sametz (b. 1954) For the rain it raineth every day. With hey, ho, & c. But when I came to man's estate, With toss-pots still had drunken heads, Orpheus with His Lute Sven Hagvil (b. 1953) With hey, ho, & c. For the rain, & c. 'Gainst knaves and thieves men shut their gate, A great while ago the world begun, Double, Double Toil and Trouble Jaakko Mäntyjärvi (b. 1963) For the rain, & c. With hey, ho, & c. But when I came, alas! to wive, But that's all one, our play is done, With hey, ho, & c. And we'll strive to please you every day. More from the Comedies Reading: “How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank!” (Lorenzo, Jessica) – The Merchant of Venice, Act V, Scene 1 Spring Robert Applebaum (b. 1941) ! Under the Greenwood Tree Martha Sullivan (b. 1964) Leonore Nelson, alto; Michael Plant, bass When That I Was and a Little Tiny Boy Matthew Harris (b. 1956) !!! Spring Love’s Labour’s Lost – Act V, Scene 2 CERDDORION THE SONG SPRING. When daisies pied and violets blue When shepherds pipe on oaten straws Sopranos Altos Tenors Basses And lady-smocks all silver-white And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks, Samantha Bassler Jamie Carrillo Ralph Bonheim Peter Cobb And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws, Do paint the meadows with delight, And maidens bleach their summer smocks Anna Harmon Clare Detko Michael Klitsch Jonathan Miller The cuckoo then, on every tree, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Jennifer Oates Susan Glass Michael Plant Mocks married men; for thus sings he, Cuckoo; Mocks married men; for thus sings he, Cuckoo; Christopher Ryan Cuckoo, cuckoo: O word of fear, Cuckoo, cuckoo: O word of fear, Jeanette Rodriguez Anna Eva Hallin Dean Rainey Ethan Wagner Unpleasing to a married ear! Unpleasing to a married ear! Ellen Schorr Myrna Nachman Tom Reingold Rebecca Schwartz Leonore Nelson Larry Sutter !!! MARTHA SULLIVAN (b. 1964) is a composer and singer. As a composer she has earned !!! commissions from the Dale Warland Singers and Gregg Smith Singers (with whom she was a resident composer from 2002 to 2008) and had her works performed by such groups as Volti (San BOARD OF DIRECTORS Francisco), The Singers (Minneapolis), and, in New York, Voices of Ascension and Cerddorion. President Ellen Schorr Treasurer Dean Rainey She was the 2009 Bronze Medalist at the Sorel Medallion competition for women composers and Secretary Jeanette Rodriguez won the Dale Warland Singers’ Choral Ventures competition in its final year (2003). As a performer, Ms. Sullivan made her New York City Opera debut on the company’s series of new Directors Peter Cobb Michael Klitsch Michael Plant operas, VOX, in 2007, as Louise in Gordon Beeferman’s The Rat Land, reprising the role in 2009; Grady Sullivan Larry Sutter Gretta Wren other highlights as a soloist include premieres by Toby Twining, John Zorn and Peter Westergaard. As a choral singer she has traveled and sung worldwide under the batons of such maestros as !!! Robert Shaw, James Levine, Robert Bass, Gregg Smith, Seiji Ozawa, Sarah Caldwell and Robert Spano. The members of Cerddorion are grateful to James Kennerley and the Church of Saint Ignatius of Antioch for providing rehearsal and performance space for this season. Under the Greenwood Tree was written for the Gregg Smith Singers in 2005. The characteristic feature of Sullivan’s charming setting is its lilting 5/4 meter, which fits the words perfectly, and is Thanks to Vince Peterson and St. Paul’s Episcopal Church for inviting Cerddorion to join the both dance-like and seductive. Interesting dynamic changes and other varied touches (including the Brooklyn Sounds concert series. use of two soloists) create a remarkable degree of contrast within this essentially strophic piece, Thanks to Cathy Markoff for her publicity efforts. honoring the simplicity of the original lyric while also capturing the listener’s attention and Thanks to all our New York composers for their contributions to this program and to our imagination. musical preparation, and especially for enriching the choral repertoire. PROGRAM CREDITS: Under the Greenwood Tree As You Like It – Act II, Scene 5 Michael Plant assembled and edited the program, compiled the poetic texts, and supplied AMIENS sings Under the greenwood tree notes on some pieces. Who doth ambition shun Who loves to lie with me, And loves to live i' the sun, Larry Sutter compiled and edited composer biographies, and proofed the text. And turn his merry note Seeking the food he eats James John provided notes on several pieces as well as the Note from the Artistic Director.