Soprano Natalie Mann and pianist Jeffrey Panko perform songs by Lori Laitman and Richard Pearson Thomas. This CD includes a complete recording of Lori’s “The Metropolitan Tower and Other Songs” as well as her “Sunflowers” cycle and the premiere recording of her new Dickinson cycle “In This Short Life.” Released by Albany Records in November 2013. To listen to excerpts, please click here. To purchase this CD, please click here.
“A stunning new release…The Metropolitan Tower belongs on any list of the finest art songs of the last thirty years…Laitman calls [Sunflowers] “one of my most complex song cycles,” …Surely that complexity sprang from the intriguing, multi-hued, nature-inspired texts of Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Mary Oliver, and Laitman responds with an exceptionally wide palette of colors and textures… There is a staggering amount of beauty and profundity in these sublime miniatures [In This Short Life] …Laitman has an unfailing ability to grasp the central essence of each of these poems and to express that essence in musical terms that seem fully authentic and perfectly true to Dickinson’s unique voice and vision. Art song composition does not get much better than this, and Mann and Panko are inspired to some of their most sensitive music-making tin the entire release.”(The Journal of Singing)
“A superb exponent of contemporary American songs, soprano Natalie Mann has a voice that is simultaneously strong and tender, passionate and subtle. Her phrasing is sensitive to the texts and unfailingly musical…Much of the album is given over to songs by the prolific Lori Laitman, a composer who is squarely in the American-romantic art song tradition of Barber and Rorem, though her harmonies are riper…Her style is lyrical, and she writes piano accompaniment that is transparent and appealing…A final reason to celebrate this album is the exquisite pianism of Jeffrey Panko…” (American Record Guide)
