Longy’s performance are free and open to the public, but please register in advance.
Hugh Hinton presents a recital of narrative and programmatic pieces which tell the deeply personal stories of their creators.
Schubert’s Moments Musicaux (Musical Moments) distill a narrative framework into a single poetic moment and are haunted by his sense of his own imminent mortality. Clara Schuman’s Four Fugitive Pieces are character pieces like the Schubert, but in her own immediately recognizable voice, inspired by her musical life shared with her husband Robert. Lili Boulanger’s 3 Morceaux, programmatic pieces written in her unique musical impressionist voices, have programmatic titles that embody her own sense of the fleeting passage of time and her own mortality.
The second half of the program features elaborate concert works by composer of African descent based on African American Spirituals. Afro-British composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor’s settings of African American Spirituals, such as Deep River and Steal Away included in this program, dramatize the narrative contained in the lyrics of the spirituals. Florence Price’s large-scale concert piece Fantasie Negre No. 1 is an extended fantasy based on the Spiritual “Sinner, Please Don’t Let This Harvest Past.” It has the ambition and scope of a work such as Chopin’s Polonaise Fantasy.