Composers Concordance Presents 'Art of the Art Song' in Brooklyn

Composers Concordance will present "Art of the Art Song" on Nov. 15 at MISE-EN_PLACE, 45 St. Nicholas Avenue, New York City. The concert will also be live-streamed for remote audiences.

Soprano Ljiljana Winkler and pianist Jai Jeffryes anchor the evening. Their program spans songs by nine composers: Seth Boustead, Carlos Castro, Eugene W. McBride, Debra Kaye, Joseph Pehrson, Gene Pritsker, Roger G. Stubblefield, Robert Voisey, and Randall Woolf.

Each composition on the program carries a video component as well. Video art comes from five artists: Lisa Barcy, Graham Elliott, Margareta Kern, Milica Parbosic — spelled Milica Paranosic in the announcement — and Roxanne Rea.

What does the format change for the audience?

The pairing matters. An art song recital typically asks the listener to hold voice and piano alone. Here, every work arrives with moving image attached, turning the recital into a hybrid of lieder evening and screening. For a 45 St. Nicholas Avenue venue like MISE-EN_PLACE, which regularly hosts new-music programming, the format extends the room beyond its walls through the live stream.

The composer list signals range. Gene Pritsker and Randall Woolf are longtime Composers Concordance figures known for genre-crossing work; Debra Kaye and Seth Boustead write for voice with theatrical instincts; Robert Voisey has built a practice around short-form, multimedia-friendly pieces. The video artists — Lisa Barcy, Graham Elliott, Margareta Kern, Milica Paranosic, Roxanne Rea — work across animation, documentary and installation.

The result, on paper at least, is a program where no two songs share the same screen language, even as all nine share one voice and one piano.

Who performs, and where

Ljiljana Winkler takes the full soprano duties for the evening. Jai Jeffryes accompanies at the piano. The single performance date is Nov. 15; the announcement names no second showing, so the live stream functions as the only other way in.

MISE-EN_PLACE sits at 45 St. Nicholas Avenue in New York City. The venue doubles as the home base of the MISE-EN ensemble, a frequent host of contemporary-music events in the borough.

What that means practically: one night, one room, one stream, fourteen creators across music and image. Listeners outside New York can watch in real time, and the Nov. 15 date gives local audiences a rare chance to hear nine living composers inside a single recital frame — with video doing part of the talking.