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The Realness of Omissions in the Classical Canon and Our Present Work to Dismantle It

Emery Stephens gives us a glimpse into his book Singing Down the Barriers as we begin the week of our 12th Festival. This gives the community an opportunity to form questions, begin discussions, and prepare themselves for the week of study.

Meisel Room
Westminster Presbyterian Church

Maggie Hinchcliffe, Trees and the Anthropocene in Art Song
In the poetry of art song repertoire, images of trees can symbolize an internal personal reflection or cultural association, allowing for interpretation on the concert stage. In German lieder, the linden tree symbolizes centuries of religious and mythological stories, while in American song repertoire, forests represent nostalgia or personal beliefs. In the twenty-first century, song composers often engage with the dissonance between idyllic natural scenes and ecological threats due to climate change and human disruption. This presentation explores the representation of trees in art song repertoire from Schubert to Ricky Ian Gordon and each composers’ approach to setting poetry that engages with their contemporary environments, and it concludes with a discussion of how trees and our everyday relationship with trees are affected by disruptions to the environment.

Meisel Room
Westminster Presbyterian Church

Emery Stephens gives us a glimpse into his book Singing Down the Barriers as we begin the week of our 12th Festival. This gives the community an opportunity to form questions, begin discussions, and prepare themselves for the week of study.

CLICK HERE FOR TICKETS

An annual favorite, Warren Jones works with the eight duos from the MNSong program. Source is invested in the education of art song, and we highlight the master in this field of song.

Meisel Room
Westminster Presbyterian Church

This conference presentation explores the multifaceted impact of Dame Ethel Smyth's art songs in the intersection of music education and LGBTQ+ studies. As a pioneering composer, member of the LGBTQ+ community, and advocate for gender equality, Smyth's works offer a unique opportunity to enrich vocal music education curricula and foster inclusivity in the collegiate voice studio. This presentation combines biographical insights into Smyth's life, presentation and musical analyses of her art songs, and practical pedagogical applications.

Chapel
Westminster Presbyterian Church

Arlene Shrut works with the eight duos from the MNSong program.

Meisel Room
Westminster Presbyterian Church

New in 2025: MNSong Composers present their works and their creativity alongside performances and presentations of their work in art song.

Meisel Room
Westminster Presbyterian Church

In 1986, American composer Philip Glass assembled several of the biggest names in popular and contemporary music to create Songs from Liquid Days: an album which bridged genre conventions and expectations. While scholars have explored Glass’s operatic works extensively, his other vocal writing has been largely ignored. In this presentation, I bring attention to Glass’s art song output using Songs from Liquid Days to resituate our understanding of his vocal works.

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Baritone Sidney Outlaw and pianist Warren Jones celebrate song with an incredible versatile and diverse recital featuring Rossini songs, Schumann’s Liederkreis, Op. 24, H. T. Burleigh’s complete Passionale, and Boykin’s 26 Ways to Look at a Black Man.

Meisel Room
Westminster Presbyterian Church

Carlotta Ferrari da Lodi (1831-1907) was an accomplished Italian composer and writer. She wrote and published many solo vocal works, piano pieces, two mass settings, and three operas for which she also wrote the librettos. In addition to her musical compositions, she published a four volume collection of her complete literary works, including her poetry, prose, librettos, and a memoir of her artistic life. Despite the quality and the breadth of her work, Ferrari is virtually forgotten today.

The lecture will focus on providing a portrait of Ferrari’s fascinating and extraordinary life as a writer and musician. Her story provides us with a unique perspective of the challenges female creatives in Italy were faced with during the late 1800s. In her memoir, she continually speaks to her “bad luck” in business and instances of prejudice against her due to her gender. Despite these obstacles, Ferrari was determined to make her way in the musical world. She knew her worth and was unwilling to compromise for less than she deserved; occasionally her own stubbornness was an impediment to her renown. Nonetheless, Ferrari did achieve musical success during her lifetime, however fleeting.

Chapel
Westminster Presbyterian Church

Kathleen Kelly works with the eight duos from the MNSong program.

Meisel Room
Westminster Presbyterian Church

My current project is setting the twenty-one poems of Federico García Lorca’s El Diván del Tamarit (“The Treasury of Tamarit”). This is Lorca’s last major collection prior to his assassination at the beginning of the Spanish Civil War. In this collection, Lorca re- imagines two Persian/Arabic poetry forms: the ghazal (Sp. “gacela”) and the qasida (“casida”). The collection includes many of his usual themes, including love and desire, death and mourning, water, the moon, children, vivid colors, and references to Andalucian culture and places. Many of these particular poems focus on a despair and a longing for mutual destruction after lost love, though others explore grief and loss in other situations. Throughout, the poems are animated by a refined yet lachrymose surrealism.

This presentation will focus on the gacelas that are already set, discussing how Lorca’s poetic structures, imagery, and Arab-Andalucian influences shape my musical choices. I will also provide some further context on the collection, as well as discuss some of Lorca’s re-imaginings of the ghazal and qasida within El Diván del Tamarit.

Westminster Hall
Westminster Presbyterian Church

Emery Stephens concludes the week with conversations around Singing Down the Barriers, and invites the community to ask “What’s Next” for performance, composition, and scholarship of African American songs and spirituals.

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Concert: An Evening with the Mill City String Quartet

Mill City String Quartet joins Source Song Festival in an evening of cycles- featuring a MNSong premiere from Marie Herrington Plyve Kacha: 3 Songs of our Past and Present, Five Folk Songs by Florence Price, and Libby Larsen's This Unbearable Stillness. This will be an unforgettable evening of chamber music-- please join us for our final event of 2025!