Before the Lied: Songs, Madrigals, and a Tribute to Pau Casals at LIFE Victoria
Next Friday, April 4, LIFE Victoria presents two recitals that go beyond Lied at the Sant Pau Recinte Modernista. To begin, at 7 PM, cellist Roger Morelló Ros will pay tribute to Pau Casals with a selection of works that portray the master’s musical tastes and give voice to his humanist side. Following this, at 8 PM, soprano Nardus Williams and theorbo player Elizabeth Kenny will offer one of the most interesting recitals of this season, featuring a selection of 16th and 17th-century songs and madrigals.
The song before the Lied
The song before the Lied
An evening of song without piano will be experienced in the debut of Nardus Williams at LIFE Victoria alongside Elizabeth Kenny on theorbo. After presenting this same program in prestigious venues such as Wigmore Hall, the performers arrive in Barcelona with a carefully curated musical selection that includes madrigals by renowned composers like Claudio Monteverdi or Giulio Caccini, as well as other names that deserve recognition, such as Giovanni Kapsberger (1566-1638), Girolamo Frescobaldi (1583-1643), or Barbara Strozzi (1619-1677).
This Venetian composer explored the art of song in a modern way, placing herself as the protagonist of her works, much like in pop music today. Strozzi left eight volumes of works, primarily secular, in which text and poetry were her main creative force, a direct influence from her father, a famous poet of the era. In this recital, Williams and Kenny will perform two of her cantatas: Tradimento from Diporti di Euterpe Op. 7 and Gite o giorni dolenti Op. 2, which will mark the beginning and end of this evening.
The program is completed with pieces by Alessandro Piccinini, Bendetto Ferrari, Francesco Rasi, and Sigismondo D’India, in addition to those mentioned above, and will be an opportunity to discover the origins and evolution of what we now call Lied.
The Voice of Casals
Cellist Roger Morelló Ros makes his debut at LIFE Victoria paying tribute to the master Pau Casals as an artist and humanist. The selection of works in this program forms a portrait of the master’s musical tastes and the most relevant composers for him, starting with the emblematic suites by Johann Sebastian Bach, which Casals unearthed to turn them into concert pieces, or the Suite for solo cello by his disciple Gaspar Cassadó. We will also hear Morelló’s arrangement of Marin Marais’ Les Voix Humaines, a look into the past that contrasts with the program’s more recent works commissioned by Pau Casals himself: Variations on the Name of Casals by Marc Migó, and Danses de la Terra by Elisenda Fábregas, in homage to his figure and his homeland.
The artistic proposal aims to highlight Casals’ humanist side, an tireless defender of peace, human rights, and freedom, who gave voice to the exiles of the Spanish Civil War and decided never to play again in countries with fascist regimes or those tolerant of dictatorships. An essential figure whose legacy reminds us that silence is as powerful as the voice itself.