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American Portraits: Andrew Garland in Recital: Andrew Garland (baritone), Donna Loewy (piano), Weill Recital Hall, New York City, 21.11.2008 (BH)

Andrew Garland, Baritone
Donna Loewy, Piano

David Conte: Everyone Sang (2004, NY Premiere)
Stephen Paulus: A Heartland Portrait (2006, NY Premiere)
Lori Laitman: Men With Small Heads (2000, NY Premiere)
Steven Mark Kohn: American Folk Set (2006, NY Premiere)
Lee Hoiby:  Last Letter Home (2006, NY Premiere)
Tom Cipullo: America 1968 (2005-2008, World Premiere)


It is hard to overstate the importance of recitals like this one: an intelligently conceived array of 21st-century songs by living American composers, some of whom could benefit from higher profiles, sung with grace, fervor and intelligence.  Andrew Garland brought his expressive baritone coupled with the occasional streak of theatricality to make this exceptionally rewarding evening at Weill Recital Hall come to life, with pianist Donna Loewy his discreet collaborator.

David Conte wrote the four songs in Everyone Sang for the West Chester (PA) University Poetry Conference, and their lush stylings seemed to inspire Garland, who only grew more confident as the program continued.  Stephen Paulus set poems by Ted Kooser for A Heartland Portrait, originally written for Thomas Hampson.  Paulus evokes the mystery of the universe with glittering treble writing in "Flying at Night," and I found the final song, "A Summer Night," notable for its slightly melancholic evocation of time passing.

In contrast, Lori Laitman's Men with Small Heads had many in the audience laughing.  The title song refers to a small child gazing up at adults, whose heads appear to be disproportionately tiny.  "Refrigerator, 1957" contains an unopened jar of maraschino cherries, brimming with fascination to someone weaned on bland food, and "A Small Tin Parrot Pin" uses internal rhyme and wordplay to smirking effect, coupled with Laitman's light, brisk vocal writing.  But the final song might have been the funniest: "Snake Lake," in which the singer uses an overly sibilant "s" in every word that that has one.

The second half of the program was unexpectedly moving.  The centerpiece of Steven Mark Kohn's American Folk Set (2006) is an arrangement of "The Gallows Tree," in which a man about to be hanged is saved by his beloved.  Kohn's mellow language fit well with "Ten Thousand Miles Away," originally from Carl Sandburg, and "Hell in Texas" amusingly describes the state as created by the Devil himself.  Garland followed this with Lee Hoiby's almost unbearable Last Letter Home, with text taken from Private First Class Jesse Givens, who drowned in Iraq in 2003.  Hoiby's delicacy in setting the soldier's tragic words (only intended to be read in the event of his death) and Garland's straightforward delivery of them, had some in the audience wiping away tears.

But it was Tom Cipullo's America 1968 that benefited unexpectedly from recent current events.  Cipullo's texts come from Robert Hayden, the first black poet to serve as a poetry consultant to the Library of Congress.  The raw messages of "The Whipping" and "Those Winter Sundays" ultimately led to the stirring "Frederick Douglas" with its promise of freedom.  I doubt anyone in the audience was listening without contemplating the historic arrival of a certain person who, in January, will become President of the United States.

Bruce Hodges


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