Program Masters Recital Marinero en Tierra, Op. 27 Rodolfo Halffter I. ¡Qué altos los balcones! (1900-1987) II. Casadita III. Siempre que sueño las playas IV. Verano V. Gimiendo por ver el mar Tornami a vagheggiar, Alcina George Friderick Handel (1685-1759) Mishelle Cipriani, soprano A Dream in Summer Night Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov Student of Julie Wright-Costa Op. 56, No. 2 (1844-1908) Intermission Saturday, November 7, 2020 Libby Gardner Concert Hall Virtual Venue - https://music.utah.edu/libby-live/index.php This recital is presented as partial fulfillment for 8:00 p.m. the requirements for the Master of Music degree. Program Cont. Liederkreis, Op. 39, No. 5 Robert Schumann Mondnacht (1810-1856) Wanderer’s Nightsong II Franz Liszt Uber allen Gipfeln ist Ruh (1811-1886) Fünf Lieder, Op. 105, No. 2 Johannes Brahms Immer leiser wird mein Schlummer (1833-1897) Suleika I, D. 720 Franz Schubert (1797-1828) Trois Melodies, IMF 7 Manuel De Falla I. Les Colombes (1876-1946) II. Chinoiserie III. Séguidille Songs from the Countryside, No. 5 Michael Head Sweet Chance that led my Steps Abroad (1900-1976) Love’s Philosophy, Op. 3, No. 1 Roger Quilter (1877-1953) Love went a-riding, H. 114 Frank Bridge (1879-1941) Program Notes / Words and Translation Rodolfo Halffter (1900-1987) Rafael Alberti (1902-1999) Marinero en Tierra Op. 27 (1945) Rodolfo Halffter was a Spanish born Mexican composer who fled to Mexico in 1936 during the Spanish Civil War. While growing up, his mother trained him in music. He taught himself composition and received some advice from Manuel de Falla. Halffter was a member of the group Grupo del los Ocho; a group of young Spanish composers devoted to maintaining a nationalistic style using modern compositional technique. He was also interested in Neoclassicism, especially the works of Stravinsky, allowing him to incorporate more harmonic and rhythmic depth. He wrote Marinero en tierra in 1925, the same year Rafael Alberti had his poems published. These five songs incorporate the style of cante jondo, which is also heard in the short, lyric poetry. Qualities of cante jondo include changing time signature to follow poetic meter, Andalusian cadences in the Phrygian mode, tonal ambiguity, textural repetition, dynamic extremes, and personification. Halffter uses harmonic dissonances to create frustration and pain to the character. He also uses layers of rhythm to make the sounds of clapping, the strumming of guitars, and the waves on the ocean. The fascinating theme in this cycle is the theme of longing. This longing is for what is familiar and what feels like home. Although I haven’t found any commentaries on why Halffter chose these poems, but I can only imagine that Halffter felt this loss of his home in Spain and Alberti’s poems provided the words he needed to set the songs of his heart. ¡Qué altos los balcones! My translation: How high are the balconies of my house? But you cannot see the sea. How low! Higher, climb up my balcony, trek the air without stalling: be the terrace of the sea, be the tower of the ship. “Whose is the flag of that lookout tower?” “Sailors, it is mine!” (Mishelle Cipriani) Casadita He carries her from Spain, the place that she most loved, her husband, a Genoese sailor. “Goodbye, walls from birth, crowns of Andalusia! “So far: Oh, how they tremble, “the bells of Cadiz, they loved me so much!” (Mishelle Cipriani) Siempre que sueño las playas Every time I dream of the beaches I only dream of them, my love. …Perhaps some sailors… As well as a small sail from a distant sailboat. (Mishelle Cipriani) Verano “I return from the drive-in theater, mother, from seeing a fake sea and a real sea, which is not the sea, but it is the sea.” “You shall never return to the drive-in theater, son, That wasn’t the sea in the movies, yet it is the sea.” (Mishelle Cipriani) Gimiendo por ver el mar Desperate to see the sea, a little sailor on land laments to the air: “Oh, my sailors blouse; always inflated from the wind when seeing the breakwater!” (Mishelle Cipriani) G. F. HANDEL (1685-1759) Riccardo Broschi (1698 – 1756) ALCINA (premiered 16 April 1735) Handel’s Alcina was written for an English audience premiering in 1735 at the King’s Theater. He wrote this during one of the most difficult times in his career. One might think at first it is because he wrote it in eight week’s time during the Lenten season, or because he only spent seven days rehearsing it before the premiere. But these are only the surface of the trials that faced Handel during the years leading up to this opera. The Royal Academy of Music where Handel began performing his works in London closed in 1728. One year later he reopened the company with his impresario under their own management. He also gained competition from English composers in 1732 and was asked to write English operas rather than Italian by a former collaborator. After another company opened in 1733, all of his singers except for Anna Strada who premiered Alcina, left for this company. Unauthorized performances of Handel’s operas also took place at competitors companies as well. Despite these circumstances, he still wrote on of the most beautiful operas to grace the earth. As Baroque opera has gained attention from modern audiences, this opera has become one of Handel’s most well-loved. Morgana, Alcina’s sister, both of whom are sorceresses, sings this aria to Ricciardo, a knight who has come to their palace. She has fallen in love, but doesn’t realize Ricciardo is actually a woman named Bradamante in disguise who has come to rescue her fiancé Ruggiero from the evil clutches of Alcina. As Ricciardo continues to reject Morgana’s advances, she sings this piece trying to draw him into her own clutches of love. Come back to woo me; only you does this faithful soul wish to love, my dearly beloved, dear one! I have already given you my heart: my love will be true; never will I be cruel to you, my dear hope. (Robert L. Larson) Manuel DE FALLA (1876-1946) Trois Melodies (1909) Pierre-Jules-Théophile Gautier (1811 - 1872) As I studied this ethereal set of songs, I grew deeper in my practice as an actor and interpreter. I found these pieces at first to be difficult to relate to in many ways. The music was so difficult I had a hard time singing these pieces without overly-focusing and being hypercritical of every note, making sure they were perfect. I wasn’t able to deepen my relationship with these pieces until I started understanding them from an artistic perspective. I wrote my own rhythmic translations for each of them which I provided for you. This means they aren’t word for word, or even have a rhyming scheme, but they helped me connect more with the pieces as I learned to sing them in my own language. This method helped me to connect with the words, feelings, moods, thoughts, motivations, and more of what these poems actually mean. These have become some of my favorite songs and I hope you enjoy them too! Manuel de Falla began studying composition in his hometown of Cadiz and eventually studied in Madrid at the Madrid Conservatory. De Falla had strong opinions on Spanish music and much of his music is in the character of Spanish-folk music as well as strongly influenced by French and Russian styles. He believed too many Spanish composers imitated the Italians and Germans to their own detriment. Spaniards had no written tradition, but they did have dances, rhythms and modes common in their own music. He desired the incorporation of these Spanish qualities that were so uncommon in Spanish classical music. In 1907 he left for Paris where he learned how to study Spanish-folk music. In Paris, he eventually wrote Trois Melodies. It premiered at the Société Musicale Indépendante on May 4, 1910, sung by Madame Ada Adiny-Milliet with de Falla accompanying on the piano. The three movements all include words by the French poet Théophile Gautier. Each sets a different scene and mood. Les Colombes contains a continuous pattern of septuplets from the piano under the voice, which sings in duple against the accompaniment. Chinoiserie begins as a recitative and then moves briskly with a legato vocal line and peppy accompaniment. The “Seguidilla” is written in the style of “Espanolas,” meaning foreign imitations of Spanish music, such as rhythm and melody, are implemented in the piece. He gained great colleagues while there such as Claude Debussy and Paul Dukas. Les Colombes On the hill-side o’er there are all the graves, A lovely palm tree with her plume of green Stood on her head, during dusk all the doves Come to build a nest and to shelter themselves. But at the dawn they all flock to the skies; From the branches like a collar, we see them As they scatter in the air, a cloud of white, Then farther off they settle on a roof. My soul is like the tree where every evening, My visions swirl around my head in white Falling from the sky, the wings keep palpitating Then they take flight at the first light of dawn. (Mishelle Cipriani) Chinoiserie It is not you, no, my lady, that I love Nor you, no more, Juliette, nor you Ophelia, Nor Beatrix, not even Laure the Blonde, With her great soft eyes. The one that I love now is in China; She is living with her old parents there, In a tall tower of fine porcelain By the Yellow River, there are the cormorants.