Congratulations to UNO Keyboard Area Faculty Stacie Haneline, who performed a concert with Dr. Jamie Reimer at the Omaha Conservatory of Music. The performance will be repeated at UNL on Friday, September 29 at 7:30pm (Kimball Recital Hall). Below are some program notes from the Omaha Conservatory of Music performance held on Friday, September 23, 2016:

Recital ideas come from unlikely places. Last winter, Stacie invited me to sing through some Schubert songs she was preparing for recital with a singer on the east coast. We’ve known each other for over a decade, and performed together here and there, but the idea of a full-length recital had never really come up. At that impromptu rehearsal, we realized how many ideas we shared about interpreting art songs, and how much we appreciated each other as collaborators. Thus, DUO was born.

 

We selected music that we both loved. Some we had played with others before, and some was brand new to both of us. The unifying factor among all of the selections was the equal importance of the pianist and singer in each composition; so, naturally, our first choice was Franz Schubert, the father of German Lieder.  His 1814 composition, “Gretchen am Spinnrade,” redefined art song as a collaboration between piano and voice, giving the piano greater importance in the storytelling than ever before.

 

Claude Debussy’s Ariettes Oubliées were composed from 1885-1887 to the poetry of Paul Verlaine. The quasi recitativo text setting gives the impression of reciting, rather than singing, the poetry over the harmonic atmosphere created by the piano. The musical language is sophisticated and through composed, developing with the drama of each poem. The voice tells the story, and the piano brings it to life.

 

Closing the program is Jake Heggie’s Natural Creation, set to the poetry of Gini Savage. This remarkably sophisticated work is a song cycle that we had the pleasure to learn together. I had been acquainted with selected songs, but when prepared in the context of the whole cycle, each song had a deeper and richer meaning. Viewed in the context our individual experiences as women, wives, and mothers, the cycle spoke to us in both similar and different ways, creating an artistic experience that was more personal and profound than perhaps any I have had before.

 

We hope you enjoy this musical journey with us, and that you may find elements of your own journey within.