Grammy-winning baritone Will Liverman focused his True Concord Voices & Orchestra Tucson Desert Song Festival recital last Tuesday on African-American composers from the Harlem Renaissance, including Margaret Bonds.
Arizona Theatre Company's production ofΒ "Ain't Misbehavin',"Β running through Feb. 14 at the Temple of Music and Art, looks at the Harlem Renaissance through the lens of one of its biggest innovators, jazz singer/songwriter Fats Waller.
But arguably no one at the festival, which continues through April 25, is delving as deeply into the pivotal moment in Black history and American culture as the MirΓ³ Quartet and soprano Karen Slack.
Grammy-winning soprano Karen Slack will make her Tucson debut with the MirΓ³ Quartet on Wednesday when they perform the world premiere of a song cycle commissioned by Arizona Friends of Chamber Music.Β
Their Song Festival concert with Arizona Friends of Chamber Music on Wednesday, Jan. 28, is centered on the works of five 20th-century African-American composers, two of them β Bonds and William Grant Still β seminal figures in the Harlem Renaissance.
The program is anchored by the world premiere of Brooklyn composer Tamar-kali's new song cycle "Pleasure Garden," commissioned by Arizona Friends for the quartet.Β
"It's such an interesting work, and Tamar-kali is such an interesting and unique composer," the MirΓ³'s violist John Largess said during a phone call from the quartet's tour in Hawaii earlier this month. "TheΒ inspiration for this work, and really for the whole program focusing on women and also the influence of the Harlem Renaissance, is something that Karen and the MirΓ³ Quartet have been working on since 2020."
The MirΓ³ QuartetΒ β from left, William Fedkenheuer, John Largess, Daniel Ching and Joshua GindeleΒ β will performΒ a world premiere of a song cycle commissioned by Arizona Friends of Chamber Music as part of their Tucson Desert Song Festival concert Wednesday.
Since the pandemic, the quartet and Slack, who won a Grammy last year for her album "Beyond the Years: Unpublished Songs of Florence Price," have performed a number of concerts centered on works by Price and Bonds. Price was a pivotal figure in the 1920s-'30s Black cultural renaissance in Chicago.
"We've performed some very interesting programs with Karen in the last five years," Largess said.Β "We've performed the William Grant Still ('Songs of Separation') and the Margaret Bonds 'Creek-Friedman Songs' with her. I arranged those for quartet and voice and created a very interesting program that was much more about Margaret Bonds, who is, maybe as far as African-American women, the premier voice in classical music from the Harlem Renaissance."
What was missing, Largess said, was a new work.Β
Slack had worked with Tamar-kali, the Brooklyn-born composer and a popular musician in New York's 1990s underground punk rock scene, and introduced Largess to her music.
"I really didn't know her music until we started this project and started looking for composers that would be a good fit," Largess said. "We got to know her music as we were exploring. So interesting, so cool, so unique to me and again, yet within our tradition with her own voice."
When the quartet and Slack arrive in Tucson this week, they will rehearse the work together for the first time; Tamar-kali will sit in on one of those rehearsals "so we can do some workshopping of the piece with her," Largess said.Β
"I'm really looking forward to working with Tamar-kali and getting her input on how she wants the nuances of the music shaped," he said. "I'm trying not to be too hyperbolic here, but her piece is sort of the crowning jewel of the concept of the program."
The MirΓ³ Quartet will team up with Grammy-winning soprano Karen Slack for the world premiere of a new work by composer Tamar-kali that's inspired by Harlem Renaissance female poets.Β
"Pleasure Garden" is the link from the present to the Harlem Renaissance's past, showing how the movement "still resonates through American life and through musical life around the world."
Largess said Tamar-kali's musical language is contemporary and accessible and reflects the African-American community.
"Not that one can ever say that any single voice expresses the voice of the community, but I would say she's very much representative of contemporary classical music and contemporary music," he said. "We're proud of being able to represent that and also proud of being able to bring a new piece like this to the stage."
This is the second work that Arizona Friends of Chamber Music commissioned for the MirΓ³, which has been performing in the Friends chamber music series for a number of years, including at last year's Tucson Winter Chamber Music Festival. The quartet performed the 2014 world premiere of Gunther Schuler's string quartet that the Tucson chamber group co-commissioned with several others.Β
TheΒ first half of Wednesday's concert is bookended by Barber's Quartet in B minor β the first movement opens the concert, the second andΒ third movements close out the first half.Β
The program also includes Largess's arrangement of William Grant Stills' "Songs of Separation"; George Walker's "Lyric for Strings"; the third movement of Price's String Quartet No 2 in A minor; and Bonds' "Creek-Freedman Songs."
