Aphrodite & Athena: A Portrait in Music of Isabella Stewart Gardner
Passionate art lover Isabella Stewart Gardner (1840 - 1924) created a museum to house her personal collection in the most perfect surroundings. Our portrait focuses on some of the seemingly contradictory aspects of Mrs. Gardner's life. Her cousin Thomas Jefferson Coolidge wrote to her: "You must have a double, one devoted to society, music, admiration and pearls, and the other sterner sister given to labor and duty; a kind of Aphrodite with a lining of Athene." Aphrodite and Athena includes an MVE-commissioned setting of three of Ms. Gardner's letters from composer Scott Wheeler, as well as a commission from composer Christopher Berg.
Concert à la carte
Food and the pleasures of dining take center stage in this concert of American song featuring works by Stephen Schwartz, Cole Porter, and Leonard Bernstein, as well as Mirror Visions Ensemble commissions from Christopher Berg, Christopher Culpo, and Richard Pearson Thomas's Clean Plates Don't Lie, based on the writings and menus of Chef Dan Barber.
Crossing the Channel: Songs of Britten and Ravel
Crossing the Channel is an in-depth exploration of two of our favorite composers, Benjamin Britten and Maurice Ravel. Writing just across the English Channel from one another, folk songs from both are featured heavily, as well as settings of William Blake, Auden and Thomas Hardy.
The Disappearing Art of Letter Writing
The Mirror Visions Ensemble explores The Disappearing Art of Letter Writing: letters of love and vengeance, reports from the North Pole, missives asking for money or forgiveness. Featured is the correspondence of Abraham Lincoln, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Stéphane Mallarmé, and Gertrude Stein. Tom Cipullo provides indispensable instruction for letter writing with the newly commissioned What Shall I Say?, along with works by Gwyneth Walker, Cole Porter, Erich Wolfgang Korngold, Dominick Argento, Richard Pearson Thomas and Christopher Berg.
Emmanuel Chabrier: Impressionism in Music, Painting and Life
A portrait in music of composers Emmanuel Chabrier, featuring a program of works by Chabrier and his composer friends such as Vincent d'Indy, Henri Duparc and Ernest Chausson (Chabrier's friends and contemporaries), as well as a commission of texts from Chabrier's known correspondence, set by Christopher Berg.
Flights of Fantasy
Explore worlds of mystery and magic through pieces about enchanted forests, whispering waters, and the creatures that inhabit them. Sibelius, Schubert, Gershwin, Schumann and other come together with Scales and Tales -- a MVE commission by Gilda Lyon that give an historical account of mythological beast.
From Noon to Starry Night and a Visit with Emily
This program celebrates two of America's foremost poets, Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson, through the eyes of two American composers, Russell Platt and Tom Cipullo. From Noon to Starry Night, a Walt Whitman cantata by Russell Platt, is, in the words of the composer, a merging of "several Whitmans into one -- the "roughneck" Whitman, the democratic Whitman, the transcendentalist Whitman, Whitman the "lover of comrades", and Whitman the bard of war."" Cipullo's A Visit with Emily sets not only her poetry but also her correspondence, giving us a nuanced look at the enigmatic woman.
Journeys
The Mirror Visions Ensemble sings its way to far-flung destinations, real and imaginary. Travel songs by Barber, Berlioz, Blangini, Duparc, Haydn, Poulenc and Hugo Wolf share the ride with commissions by Tom Cipullo and Scott Wheeler, as well as Gilda Lyons' "Great Barrier Reef." The poetry of Baudelaire, Joyce and Metastasio is featured, as well as the correspondence of Paul Bourget, Henry James and Edna St. Vincent Millay.
Leaves of the Butterfly Tree: Poetry of Linda Pastan and Jeffrey Greene
A program celebrating the poetry of Linda Pastan and Jeffrey Greene, comprised entirely of Mirror Visions commissions.
Midnight Magic
Midnight Magic: The sun has set, the gloaming has gone, and stillness has settled in. As the clock strikes twelve, something mystical begins to stir…the night brings a wonder all its own. Mirror Visions Ensemble’s concert, Midnight Magic explores the witching hour through musical favorites from Debussy, Mozart, Britten, Bonds, Barber, Price, Sondheim and more - including MVE commissions by Andrew Gerle, Harold Meltzer, Russell Platt and Carlos Simon. Texts and translations are available here. Access to the full program can be found here.
Night and Dreams
Night and Dreams begins with a languorous collection of nocturnal songs from Respighi, Grieg, Schubert and others, and continues with works from contemporary composers Tom Cipullo, Scott Wheeler and Yehudi Wyner, ending with Wyner's setting of Lewis Carroll's Mad Tea Party scene: "Was it a dream?"
Of Beasts and Brutes
Join MVE for an afternoon of art song that playfully and seriously explores the animalizing (and humanizing) that can arise under the sway of beasts and brutes. Featuring three world premieres from composers Francine Trester, Scott Wheeler and Christopher Berg, the program also includes works by Tchaikovsky, Handel, Shostakovich and Hanns Eisler.
Reflections and Projections: 25 Years of Mirror Visions
The Mirror Visions Ensemble commemorates its 25th anniversary with a program featuring favorites from its repertoire including Tom Cipullo's song cycle A Visit With Emily, together with four new works by the winners of MVE's inaugural Young Composers Competition. Sopranos Vira Slywotzky and Justine Aronson, tenor Scott Murphree, Jesse Blumberg and Mischa Bouvier, baritone will be joined by pianists Alan Darling and Margaret Kampmeier.
Sounds of Swedish Poetry
Favorite songs by Rangström, Sibelius and Stenhammer, alongside world premieres from Swedish composers Jonas Forssell, Hans Gefors, Kim Hedås, Anders Nilsson, Kjell Perder, Ylva Skog and Andrea Tarrodi.
This Land is Ours
A sung celebration of urban, suburban, and rural life - its moods, landscapes and sounds -- This Land is Ours features music by immigrants (Kurt Weill, Paul Hindemith, Hanns Eisler, and Erich Korngold), women (Ruth Crawford Seeger, Francine Trester), and African Americans (Adolphus Hailstork, Brittney Boykin, Florence Price and Leslie Adams), as well as by classic American composers (Charles Ives, Leonard Bernstein, Samuel Barber, and Pete Seeger). This Land is Ours also includes Mirror Visions commissions from Mohammed Fairouz, Braxton Blake, and Harold Meltzer.
When Icicles Hang by the Wall
Ring in the holiday season with Mirror Visions Ensemble and hear how various cultures celebrate this festive time of year through folk songs and carols from Germany, Sweden, France, England, Australia, and the US.