A LAND OF LOST CONTENT:
Heine’s poetry explored in song
SATURDAY 3RD JULY 2021 - 7.30 PM
BARITONE JULIEN VAN MELLAERTS WITH PIANIST NANCY COOLEY
Heine’s lyric, understated and disenchanted poetry inspired some of the greatest and most beloved Lieder. Tonight we perform Schubert’s Schwanengesang: Heine-Lieder, Robert Schumann’s Dichterliebe, and settings by Clara Schumann, Mendelssohn, Brahms and Liszt.
JULIEN VAN MELLAERTS
NANCY COOLEY
"As a well-deserved award winner of numerous singing competitions, Julien Van Mellaerts became the shooting star of the evening in the title role of Figaro"
(Salzburg Mozart Week / Das Opernmagazin)
New Zealander Julien, who sang in the complete Wolf’s Italienisches Liederbuch with Keval Shah here in 2018, has an abundance of awards to his name, including the Maureen Forrester Prize and German Lied Award at the 2018 Concours Musical International de Montréal.He was winner of the 2017 Wigmore Hall / Kohn Foundation International Song Competition and of the 2017 Kathleen Ferrier Prize. He already has an extremely busy international career in opera and in song collaborations with major artists.
He performs here in duo with the festival’s Artistic Director.
Nancy won the accompanist’s prize in the Walther Grüner International Lieder Competition in 1987 and since then has specialised in song repertoire and in chamber music, performing around the country and abroad including concerts for the BBC, Wigmore Hall, the South Bank and at St. John’s, Smith Square, and performances at the Aldeburgh, Brighton, Edinburgh, Cheltenham and Aix en Provence festivals, as well as many local festivals around Britain.
Nancy performed with the Fitzwilliam Quartet here in 2019. She coaches at the Royal College of Music, and is a founder member of the South Downs Chamber Ensemble along with local musicians Sebastian Comberti and Sally Beamish.