IN HER VOICE: LunART String Quartet with Soprano Sarah Brailey

LunART Chamber Music Collective is thrilled to return to Mineral Point Opera House, presenting “In Her Voice” featuring GRAMMY Award-winning soprano Sarah Brailey in a program of chamber works with string quartet. In LunART’s signature style, and commemorating March as Women’s History Month, the concert will spotlight a culturally and stylistically diverse set of contemporary women composers, each a distinct voice with a story to tell.

LunART with Sarah Brailey will perform Saturday, March 1, at 7 PM at the Opera House, with doors opening at 6 PM. Reserved tickets go on sale Monday, Nov. 25, at 8 AM for members of Friends of the MPOH. Members of the general public can purchase tickets beginning Monday, Dec. 2. Tickets to this and all other Opera House events can be found at tickets.mpoh.org.

Vocal text lays a thematic foundation for this program, one of light and transformation. In The Light Blurred by the Stars, composer Eliza Brown has created musical vignettes from five poems by Susan Stewart, touching on themes of human survival and renewal. Renaissance prose meets the English choral tradition in Rebecca Clarke’s Daybreak, as if a madrigal has time-traveled to the 20th century. Changing Light by Kaija Saariaho (Finland), Nocturne pour Caline by Danae Xanthe Vlassee (France, Greece), and Sarah Kirkland Snider’s Chrysalis stir up a pristine spectrum of tonal colors.

The concert will also give audiences a sneak preview of what’s to come for LunART’s upcoming summer festival with Shuo, a string quartet by 2025 Composer-in-Residence Chen Yi. The Chinese word for “initiate,” ”shuo” also refers to the beginning of a new moon cycle. Dr. Chen, a Guggenheim fellow and former violinist with Peking Opera, seamlessly blends Chinese and Western musical language into a voice all her own.

Cuban composer and operatic soprano Barbara Llanes and Pulitzer Prize-winner Caroline Shaw draw listeners into an intimate space in contrasting and complementary ways. Llanes brings Spanish poetry to life in a trio of jaunty, dance-like settings with a touch of melancholy, while Shaw transports us from ethereal folk hymns to lush, reckless abandon instrumentals.

• By and By, And So, Caroline Shaw (b. 1982)
• The Light that Blurred the Stars, Eliza Brown (b. 1985)
• Chrysalis, Sarah Kirland Snider (b. 1973)
• Changing Light by Kaija Saariaho (1952-2023)
• Nocturne pour Caline, Danaë Xanthe Vlasse
• Daybreak, Rebecca Clarke (1886-1979)
• Shuo, Chen Yi (b. 1953)
• Songs for Soprano and Viola, Barbara Llanes (b. 1970)
• No te nombro (I don’t name/call you)
• Quién pudiera como el rio (Who could like the river)
• He dormido al amor (I’ve slept with love)

GRAMMY Award-winning soprano Sarah Brailey enjoys a versatile career that defies categorization. Praised by The New York Times for her “radiant, liquid tone,” and by Opera UK for “a sound of remarkable purity,” she is a prolific vocalist, cellist, recording artist, and Educator.

Sarah’s numerous career highlights include performing Handel’s L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato with the Mark Morris Dance Group, serenading the Mona Lisa with John Zorn’s Madrigals at the Louvre in Paris, and recording the role of The Soul on the world premiere album of Dame Ethel Smyth’s The Pr*son, for which she received the 2020 GRAMMY Award for Best Classical Solo Vocal Album. Other notable recent and upcoming projects include the role of the Angel in Handel’s La Resurrezione with Haymarket Opera; Julia Wolfe’s Her Story with the Lorelei Ensemble and the Boston, Chicago, Nashville, National, and San Francisco Symphony Orchestras; and David Lang’s Song of Songs at the Barbican Centre.

Sarah is a member of Beyond Artists, a coalition of artists that donates a percentage of their concert fees to non-profit organizations. Through Beyond Artists, she supports the Natural Resources Defense Council, Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness, and the Animal Welfare Institute. Sarah is the Director of Vocal Studies at the University of Chicago, the Artistic Director of the Handel Aria Competition, and serves on the voice faculty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Host or Publisher Mineral Point Opera House