Soprano Buonaiuto Kicks Off Fall Season at UB, Sept. 18
September 11, 2014
Contact: University Relations
Phone: 410.837.5739
Soprano Danielle Buonaiuto and pianist Bethany Pietroniro will perform a range of music to the poetry of ee cummings, as the University of Baltimore's live performance series, Spotlight UB, kicks off its fall 2014 season on Thursday, Sept. 18. Compositions by Dominick Argento, Salvatore Martirano, John Musto, John Duke, Gary Bachlund, Ned Rorem, Aaron Copland, William Bolcom and David Diamond will be featured. The event will take place in UB's Wright Theaer, located in the Student Center at 21 W. Mt. Royal Ave., at 7 p.m. Ticket information is listed below.
Buonaiuto appears as a soloist throughout the United States and Canada, singing a broad range of music encompassing the standard repertoire, rarely-performed operatic works, and modern music, as well as new works written especially for her. Praised for her "wonderful subtlety" and "hypnotic" presence, Buonaiuto brings compelling characterization and a gift for storytelling to her performances.
In 2011, she made her debut with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra as Knabe 1 in Die Zauberflöte. During the 2012-13 season, she was the featured soloist with the Lunar Ensemble in their U.S. tour of Pierrot Lunaire and 16 new works. Other appearances in 2012-13 included the international song competition Das Lied in Berlin, and the semifinals of the Lyndon Woodside Oratorio Competition in New York. Buonaiuto finished the season as a Bel Canto Young Artist at the Caramoor Festival in New York, singing Voix en Haut in Don Carlos.
For the 2013-14 season, Buonaiuto collaborated with Washington, D.C.-based Silver Finch Arts Collective on a new opera, in which critics found her "siren's brilliance" in the role of Artemis particularly praiseworthy. She was also seen this season in Quebec and Ontario as Musetta in La Bohème with Jeunesses Musicales Canada. In her first appearance in her hometown of Toronto in many years, Buonaiuto made an impression in her performance with Tapestry Opera: "The program closed with 'Zoo Aria' from Sanctuary Song, [which] was a haunting finale to the program and Ms. Buonaiuto sang the piece with an intensity and freedom of sound that captured its tone beautifully."
Off the operatic stage, Buonaiuto is a sought-after interpreter of new music and other concert repertoire. Appearances have included Crumb's Madrigals, Berio's Folk Songs, Golijov's Ayre, and many others. She has commissioned young Canadian and American composers; in 2013, she premiered nine new chamber works written for her, and has initiated a unique collaboration with composer Colin Read and poet Lisa Rosinsky. This collaboration resulted in her recorded debut, Songs of Innocence and Experience, last April. The collection was recorded in the Wright Theater.
Praised by Baltimore's The Glass for her "beautiful, melodic tones as well as driving percussive force," pianist Pietroniro is an avid collaborative artist. Gathering together her passions for music, languages, and literature, she is embarking on a multi-faceted career devoted to chamber music, art song, and contemporary music performance.
In June 2014, Pietroniro was awarded the Marc and Eva Stern Fellowship to attend SongFest at Colburn, where she performed under the guidance of leading artists including Graham Johnson, Rudolf Piernay, Lucy Shelton, and Suzanne Mentzer. Last year, she premiered instrumental and vocal works by emerging young composers during a residency at New Music on the Point Summer Institute. Pietroniro is an active recitalist, frequently joining her vocalist and instrumentalist colleagues in creating innovative duo-recitals. Other recent projects include coaching two celebrated operas by Benjamin Britten, The Rape of Lucretia and Albert Herring, presented by Baltimore's hexaCollective and Charm City Collegium.
Tickets for this Spotlight UB event are $5 general and free to all students, and are available at www.etix.com and one prior to the performance in the Wright lobby.
Learn more about Spotlight UB here, or send an e-mail to spotlightub@ubalt.edu to receive more information about the series.
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