“What’s the Connection?” many of you may be asking. Well, we can start the story in July 1977, when a young and enthusiastic Canadian pianist was paying his first visit to the summer school of music that Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears had founded in connection with their flourishing Aldeburgh Festival. The young musician thought he had arrived as an observer to sit in on masterclasses. Instead, he found himself filling a last minute vacancy as an accompanist - and, in the process, Bruce Ubukata met another staff pianist, Stephen Ralls. The rest, as they say, is history.
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I have written the imposed songs for vocal competitions twice – first, for the Montreal International Music Competition in 2005, and later for the Eckhardt-Gramatté competition in 2008. In both cases, the most difficult thing I found was to try to write challenging but idiomatic music for all vocal types at once, that would show off the strengths (and expose any weaknesses) of many different singers. This was truly daunting – of course different transpositions are made for the various voice types but as we know there is more difference between singers than just their available range of notes.
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As a student, in love with poetry and the art of recital, I never attended a master class session that offered a complete work-up on every aspect of what the French Art Song (or mélodie) repertoire is made. At last, and in full activity as a singer, I decided that I would, as soon as possible, found an Academy which would fulfill what I was looking for: The Académie Francis Poulenc in Tours, now 15 years old, is trying to achieve exactly that.
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Art Song, did I choose it? – or was I chosen by it. Well, I think the latter. No wonder, knowing that my dear Mother sang to me from the moment I was born. Soon we sang together and she was such a proud mother that to her it was obvious that I should sing the highest part! Her beautiful voice kept vibrating in me all my life, unconsciously I think.
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