WHEN? Saturday, May 4, 2019 at 7:30 p.m.
WHO? Letitia Stevens, soprano, with pianist Leonardo Ciampa
WHAT? A recital entitled, “Queens, Countesses & Waifs”
WHERE? St. Anne-in-the-Field’s Church (Flint Hall), 147 Concord Rd. (Rt. 126), Lincoln, MA
BY WHOM? Arts MetroWest, Inc. (Leonardo Ciampa, founding director)
THE PROGRAM? Arias from Giulio Cesare, Le nozze di Figaro, Die Zauberflöte, Maria Stuarda, Anna Bolena, and Die Fledermaus, and art songs by Donaudy and Duparc
FOR MORE INFORMATION? Leonardo Ciampa
Arts
MetroWest, Inc. (Leonardo Ciampa, founding director) ends their
2018-2019 season in style, with a recital featuring the dynamic soprano Letitia
Stevens, accompanied by the well-known collaborative musician Leonardo Ciampa.
Formerly a mezzo-soprano, Letitia has in recent seasons made the switch to dramatic coloratura soprano. “It is an exciting transformation,” said Ciampa. “Usually when singers switch voice types midway through their career, they switch downwards. I can’t think of any other singer who switched up to Queen of the Night!” According to Ciampa, however, that is not all that makes Letitia unique. “Usually singers fall into one of two categories: ‘opera singers’ who are very attuned to the acting and the emotions of the characters, but may or may not be strong musicians or vocalists; and ‘non opera singers,’ who are very strong musically and intellectually but often lack drama or vocal excitement. Letitia really is both: a ‘smart singer’ who is such a strong musician and interpreter, and has such an appealing voice, but is also very dramatic and very comfortable on the stage. In that sense, she has it all.”
We asked Letitia Stevens a few questions about her program:
Why did you want to do this program?
I wanted to do this program firstly because I wanted to work again with Leonardo, who loves Italian music, and who loves late Romantic music, which I also love.
Why this particular program?
I was walking along one day, thinking about the difference between soprano roles and mezzo-soprano roles. Mezzo-sopranos are known for singing witches, bitches, britches, and whores. And I thought, “What is the soprano equivalent of that?” It occurred to me that most soprano roles are either queens, countesses, and other ladies of that ilk, or they’re waifs, such as the orphan Amina in La sonnambula. So that was how I got the idea for the title, “Queens, countesses, and waifs.”
Why this specific repertoire?
There were things that I very much wanted to learn – and things that others very much wanted me to learn! As soon as I started singing soprano, people kept saying to me, “Oh my God, you have to sing the Donizetti queens.” Hence Anna Bolena and Maria Stuarda. Meanwhile, I had already been singing Queen of the Night, and there were other Mozart queens and countesses which I already liked singing. And I also liked singing Cleopatra, who wasn’t called a “queen,” but she was the dominant ruler of Egypt.
What else is on the program?
We didn’t want to do a whole program of only arias, which would have placed heavy demands on the voice — and on the audience! So we chose two composers of the most “yummy,” late Romantic art songs, Donaudy and Duparc.
Tell us about the transition from mezzo-soprano to soprano.
I always had the high Fs. I always had a high extension, but I never knew how to integrate it with the rest of the voice. However, when I switched teachers, I found the confidence to move up to soprano, and thanks to her I discovered this new, more robust sound and new, more energized technique. And it was then that I started singing Donaudy. Because as a mezzo-soprano, I didn’t yet have that lusher, fuller sound for this late Romantic Italian music. It was the same with Duparc. I had bought the score years ago in London, because I loved those songs, and I had always wanted to sing them. However, I never thought I had a warm enough voice for them. Now, as a soprano, with this new technique and new sound, I suddenly find that I can sing them!
What has been the most rewarding thing about becoming a soprano?
To sing with the whole voice, not to be afraid to use the whole voice, has been very exciting. And it has been exciting to find new repertoire for it, but also to revisit repertoire that I loved for a long time but never thought that I could sing.
