Pianist Lucy Mauro, of the West Virginia University music faculty, will present a recital with lyric tenor Donald George, at the Creative Arts Center, Friday, Feb. 15. The event is free and open to the public.

George, who is currently guest artist-in-residence in the College of Creative Arts, is associate professor of voice at the Crane School of Music, State University of New York Potsdam.

Titled “Cheerfulness follows the storm, and laughs!” the concert begins at 7:30 p.m. and will feature the songs and arias of Joseph Weigl (1766-1846), a contemporary of Mozart and Haydn and the once-famous composer at the court of Esterhazy in Austria.

This charming music shows the influence of German folk music, light Italian opera and virtuosic vocal and keyboard writing. Music professor Robert Thieme will narrate the one-hour program, which also includes projected images.

Mauro will be performing on the fortepiano, using a replica of one of Anton Walter’s period instruments, which the WVU School of Music owns. This is a piano that Weigl would have known and used.

George and Mauro have recently recorded this program for a new upcoming CD for Delos. The recording took place in Bloch Hall of the Creative Arts Center, with the assistance of WVU recording engineer Mark Benincosa and piano technician Tim Richards. They will also be performing the concert at Esterhazy in Austria this summer when the recording is released.

See this link for the website for the concert in Austria, with video taken in Bloch Hall:
http://esterhazy.at/de/festivalesterhazy/1302183/Dem-Sturme-folgt-die-Heiterkeit-und-lacht

Mauro and George perform nationally and internationally in their duo, Duodrama, presenting recitals, workshops and master classes and specializing in such areas as 19th-century German melodrama and the art of collaborative performance.

An internationally known opera singer, George is an established lyric tenor in the opera houses and concert halls of Europe. He has sung at La Scala, the Paris Opera Bastille and Th��tre du Ch�telet, Royal Opera of Brussels, and the State Operas of Berlin, Hamburg and Vienna, the Festivals of Salzburg, Santa Fe, Jerusalem, Istanbul, Buenos Aires, Blossom USA and Perth.

Mauro is a graduate of the Peabody Conservatory of Johns Hopkins University, from which she received bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees and where she studied with Ann Schein and Julio Esteban. She has performed and taught for schools and festivals throughout the United States and in Germany, Austria, Italy and China.

Mauro’s recent recording for the Delos label with George has been hailed in Gramophone as “Recording of the Year 2011,” by MusicWeb International as “the revelation of the year,” and featured on iTunes among “New and Noteworthy,” among other recognitions.

Robert Thieme has served as the director of WVU Opera Theatre since 1985 and became the coordinator of Vocal Studies in 1996. He has also worked as a collaborative artist with singers and instrumentalists throughout the United States and in Europe. He has been the principal keyboardist with the Wheeling Symphony and has worked on operatic productions with the West Virginia and Corpus Christi Symphonies, and the Augusta, Chautauqua, Columbus and Orlando Opera companies. For 21 years Professor Thieme was on the faculty of the American Institute of Musical studies in Graz, Austria, and served as both dean and co-artistic director of the summer training program for vocalists, pianists and instrumentalists. Since then he has worked as a musical director and vocal coach with the Richard Crittenden Opera Program in both Washington, D.C. and Boston.

For more information about the recital, contact the WVU College of Creative Arts at (304) 293-4359.

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CONTACT: Charlene Lattea, College of Creative Arts
304-293-4841 ext. 3108, Charlene.Lattea@mail.wvu.edu

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