Bringing Brahms To The People-Cantare Con Spirito Travels Vermont

- April 24, 2014

April 24, 2014

Woodstock, VT

This weekend the BarnArts Center for the Arts presents Cantare Con Spirito . The group will be performing vocal works of Brahms at Vermont venues this spring around Vermont and one date in New Hampshire.

Tour Dates:

April 25, 7 p.m. Blue Horse Inn, Woodstock;

April 26, 2 p.m. Ava Art Gallery, Lebanon, NH;

April 26, 7p.m. Bethel Town Hall, Bethel;

April 27, 10 a.m. Bethany Church, Montpelier

April 27, 4 p.m. The Recital Hall at St. Michael’s College, Colchester.

As a lover of music, albeit mostly Rock and Roll and Blues, I found Canatre Con Spirito wildly entertaining. I don't speak German, but these artists bring you into each "scene" they are singing and you can easily understand what is happening. The emotions range from anger to happiness to even a little humor.

The group was born this winter when the BarnArtsCenter’s artistic director, Jarvis Green, heard a program of program of Brahms’ quartets on the Vermont Public Radio Classical station. This coincided with an article he had read earlier that same day reflecting that to young Americans classical music has become an anomaly. He wants to change that. “That evening I called colleagues in Maine, Boston and New York City and proposed the idea of going on tour to perform an all-Brahms program. To my delight and astonishment they agreed Cantare Con Spirito (Sing with Spirit) was born,” says Green. “Our mission is to sing the music we love with the people we love in the places we love.” (Brahms, whose life spanned 1833 to 1897, belongs to the pantheon of the “Three Bs,” Bach, Beethoven and Brahms.)

“Really listening deeply for the first time to Brahms has been a transformational experience for me,” says Green, whose own musical background is rooted in both sacred and American genres. He will sing baritone/bass. Joining him will be Luette Saul of Pomfret, VT, soprano; Tesia Kwarteng who studies and performs in Manhattan, mezzo soprano; Marco Jordao of Boston, tenor; and Mark Rossnagel of Portland, ME, pianist.