The Serbian-Canadian composer Ana Sokolovic has an amazing talent for composing for the female voice, and has had ample opportunity to prove it in repeat commissions from Toronto's Queen of Puddings Theatre. The producers rightly call Sokolovic's
Love Songs 'a spectacularly virtuosic tour de force for solo female singer'. Lasting some 50 minutes, this work is a breathtaking musical and emotional roller-coaster.
Love Songs (2008) is Sokolovic's setting of fourteen of her favourite love songs in various languages, ranging from an anonymous Sanskrit lyrical poem entitled Amarusataka to the work of Walt Whitman, Paul Eluard, Shakespeare and the Roman poet Catullus. Sokolovic, born in Serbia but a resident of Montreal, Canada since the 1990s, did not limit her choice of texts to 'love' in the strictly romantic sense, but rather all variants of the theme: a son's love for his mother, love between children, for a daughter, for a deceased sibling, and so on. Interspersed with the main songs are four movements that Sokolovic calls 'doves', in which the performer sings or speaks the phrase 'I love you' in a total of 100 languages. 'Dove' is likewise a pet name for a sweetheart, and the title suggests that the cooing vocal line has an onomatopoeic function as well. Each 'I love you' evokes the universal image of the dove as the harbinger of peace or a divine spirit. The various languages are presented alphabetically: from Afrikaans to Hebrew in
Doves I, Hindi to Japanese in
Dove II, Kannada to Yoruba in
Doves III;
Doves IV is entirely in English. The work ends with Catallus's heartrending tribute to his fallen brother.
While
Love Songs immediately brings to mind Berio's vocal experiments for Cathy Berberian and his Folk Songs (1964), it is nevertheless an extremely original work. The premiere in Toronto in 2008 received rave reviews; the young Canadian mezzo-soprano Lauren Phillips, who has previously worked with Sokolovic, will repeat her stunning performance at the 2010 Holland Festival. It is more than just a collection of 'love songs': it is a gripping mono-opera that demands spectacular vocal prowess, adding theatrics and choreography. As the newspaper The Globe and Mail put it, 'Phillips goes beyond virtuosity and entered into the various states of love with purity of heart as well as voice, and conveys an exhilarating freedom and daring' in her interpretation of the myriad forms of Love. Phillips crawls, dances and flaps; she sashays and flirts; turns somersaults and drums on her thighs or a chair. But most mesmerizing are the 'doves', whether whispered or shouted, sweet or threatening. With its stylistic versatility mirroring its subject, Love Songs is not only an ode to love but also to the musical potential of the female voice.
The Canadian-Serbian composer
Ana Sokolovic was born in 1968 in Belgrade. She studied composition with Dusan Radic at the University of Novi Sad and with Zoran Eric at the University of Belgrade. Later she received her Master’s Degree from the Université de Montréal under the supervision of José Evangelista. In the summer of 1997, she participated in a composition workshop led by Tristan Murail and Denys Boulianne. Her repertoire consists of works for orchestra, for piano, for voice and various chamber ensembles. Her music has been performed in Canada, France, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Germany, Italy, Iceland, Belgium, Great Britain, and the Ukraine. She has received commissions for compositions from, among others, Esprit Orchestra, Société de Musique Contemporaine du Québec, Molinari String Quartet, Orchestre Baroque de Montréal , Ensemble Contemporain de Montréal, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Queen of Puddings Music Theatre, Manitoba Chamber Orchestra, Fibonacci Trio, Phœnix Trio, Evergreen Gamelan and many soloists.
In 1996, her composition
Ambient V was chosen to represent Canada during the International Rostrum of Composers by UNESCO in Paris. In 1999, Géométie sentimentale was awarded both the first prize in the chamber music category and the Grand Prix during the 13th Concours de Radio-Canada. Her first opera,
The Midnight Court (2005), was performed in 2006 in the Royal Opera House in London. In 2005, she won the Joseph S. Stauffer Prize of the Canadian Council for the Arts and in 2008, the Prix Opus for ‘Composer of the Year’. Sokolovic is affiliated with the Canadian Music Centre and in 2007-2008 was guest lecturer for composition at the Université de Montréal.
Shannon Mercer has been hailed as one of Canada's most promising young sopranos. Her voice has been described as luminous, dazzling and shining and her acting witty, delightful, and feisty.
An alumnus of San Francisco Opera's prestigious Merola Opera Summer Program, Mercer began her operatic career as a member of the Canadian Opera Company Ensemble Studio Program. From there she went on to perform major roles with the Canadian Opera Company, the opera’s of Quebec, Ottawa and Ontario and the Toronto Operetta Theater.
In 2004 Mercer won the Bernard Diamant Prize. She spent most of 2005 in Vienna where she studied German operatic repertoire with renowned voice coach Margaret Singer.
In July 2006 Mercer made her London debut under the auspices of the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in
The Midnight Court with Toronto's Queen of Puddings Music Theatre, the Canadian production company that is staging
Love Songs with Mercer at this year’s Holland Festival.
Particularly praised for her performances of baroque and contemporary music, Mercer maintains a challenging balance of opera, concert and recital appearances. This season she has appeared, amongst other things, in
Die Zauberflöte in Ottawa, Victoria and London; in Eric Idle’s Not the Messiah at London’s Royal Albert Hall; in Bach’s Weihnachtsoratorium in Carnegie Hall; and in Mozart and Schubert recitals in Ottawa and Toronto.
Shannon's discography includes several award-winning releases. In 2004 she was widely praised for her debut album
English Fancy on the Analekta label. In 2007 Glossa released a cd with Mercer in the title role in Marin Marais’
Sémélé. In 2009 she won a Juno award for her album
Gloria! Vivaldi’s Angels. With her latest release,
Wales, The Land of Song, Mercer recalls her Welsh roots through traditional Welsh songs in new arrangements.
Shannon Mercer also stars in a series of eight short vignettes of the comic opera
Burnt Toast, directed by Larry Weinstein.