Worcester, Mass. - The Shakespeare Concerts, featuring the music of Berlioz, Britten, Brahms and Worcester-based opera composer Joseph Summer, will present an evening of music based on the words of William Shakespeare, beginning at 8 p.m., Saturday, March 17, in Razzo Hall of the Traina Center for the Arts, Clark University, 92 Downing Street.A second concert is scheduled at 8 p.m., Monday, March 19, at the New England Conservatory of Music's Jordan Hall, Boston.
The seasons play a major role in the sonnets of Shakespeare, arguably the greatest set of poems in the English language. Of the four seasons, the bard was fondest of summer. Audiences will hear how these composers brought their own interpretations of Shakespeare to life in the form of opera, song, and musical tone-painting. Mr. Summer, whose settings of more than sixty sonnets and scenes from the Shakespeare canon are collectively titled "The Oxford Songs," was naturally attracted to those sonnets of summer. The concerts will feature his own realization of "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day" for mezzo-soprano, flute, and string quintet. The setting is pastoral and gentle, evoking the beauty of a young girl gathering flowers in a field. Summer was inspired to write the aria as he looked out of his studio window at his daughter gathering daisies and singing to the wind, when she was four years old.
The Shakespeare Concerts music director and pianist is John McGinn, a Clark University assistant professor of music. Other featured performers are Kellie Van Horn, mezzo-soprano; Alan Schneider, tenor; Eve Gigliotti, soprano; Quartet X, with violinists Krista Reiser and Rohan Gregory, violist Peter Sulski (also a member of the Clark faculty), and cellist Jan Müller-Szeraws; Sarah Brady, flute; and Max Zeugner, double-bass.
Both events of The Shakespeare Concerts are free to the public. For more information, contact 508-363-4460.