Photo: Matt Duboff
After months of planning, pianist Lisa Rumpel's visions have come to life as part of City of Song. Taking the stage in front of an audience of 150 people at the West End Cultural Centre, this celebration of Winnipeg through poetry and song featured the world premiere of Too Far to Walk, an operatic art song cycle. The work was created by Winnipeg-raised, Waterloo based composer Karen Sunabacka, with lyrics from the poetry of John Samsons Fellows, formerly of The Weakerthans. This reimagining took some of Samson Fellows' best-known work- like Reconstruction Site and Elegy for Elisabet - and set it to new music for piano and voice.
“I’ve always been a big fan of The Weakerthans, and I always thought that it would be great to make them into art songs because I do only classical music. What’s special about [art song] is the intimate relationship between piano and voice — how through the words and music together, they tell the story and the piano almost becomes a character itself." – Lisa Rumpel for The Winnipeg Free Press
Photo: Matt Duboff
Fresh off being named the winner of the Governor General’s Literary Award for Poetry earlier in the week, Winnipeg Poet Laureate Chimwemwe Undi opened the evening with a reading accompanied by cellist Nathan Krahn.
Photo: Matt Duboff
Local singer-songwriter Theresa Thor shared songs off her latest album Revery.
Photo: Matt Duboff
Opera singers Aaron Hutton and Dawn Bruch-Wiens brought the work to life, imbuing the space with their soaring voices.
"I think that when people hear these words and rehear this poetry from songs they're familiar with, they're going to have their own connection to this chilly city and whether it's a positive or otherwise interpretation, we all as Winnipeggers have connections to a thought or something being just a bit too far to walk to in the wintertime," – Aaron Hutton for Classic 107
Photo: Matt Duboff