On Thursday 9 April Erin Nizolak is performing in the Music Room at Stansted House, accompanied by pianist Richard Dewland, violinist Deborah Gatland and mezzo-soprano Bridget Dean in their performance of After Silence.
Erin tells us more about the recital and herself.
Originating from the USA, I feel I’m a bit of an ambassador. I like to include some American composers in my repertoire. I’ll be starting with Copland’s Why Do They Shut Me Out of Heaven? Then we’ve got Carlisle Floyd, who composed a really beautiful opera called Susannah, which is set in Appalachia. And then we’ll also be doing some of the “standard” pieces, including some pieces by Mozart (including Sull’aria, from Le nozze di Figaro) and Puccini (including Soave sia il vento from Così fan tutte), as well as pieces by Sarasate, Mendelssohn, Dvořák, Fauré and Satie. I’ll also be singing some of the art songs by Richard Strauss.
Richard Dewland is my accompanist. He actually will be singing at one point too. He sings and accompanies himself at the same time. He’s a great multitasker. And then my friend Deborah Gatland, who’s a violinist, will also be playing with me. She’ll be doing a couple of solo-y bits and also joining me on a couple of the Richard Strauss art songs; they have really beautiful violin pieces included with them. So it worked out really wonderfully to have her play with us. And then also my friend Bridget Dean will be singing a couple of pieces with me.
I chose the title After Silence for the concert because it’s my first time coming back to singing after a long period of silence. I went to university to study vocal performance. But I took a long time off in the middle where I wasn’t really performing at all or doing much professionally with music because I was in the midst of raising a lot of children.
The idea of coming back to performing after such a long period when I wasn’t doing it made me nervous. I simply thought, I’ll embrace it. I’ll embrace the nerves. I’ll embrace the excitement.
Motherhood and fatherhood takes its toll on all our careers, especially to us as musicians, because of all the punishing sort of routines that one has to follow.
I’m most interested in the storytelling in music, and communicating it through the emotions. I think music has a unique ability to tell stories outside of our thinking brains, and that is what always has and continues to draw me to singing. I am someone who finds it difficult to turn their thinking brain off. I have found the embodiment required in music making to be helpful.
I have a soft spot in my heart for the romantics such as Puccini. I like a German romantic piece too, such as by Strauss. Richard Strauss will always have my heart. I love the art songs from Germany, the lieder. The romanticists are very good for my voice type because I have quite a dark soprano voice. But it’s more that the emotion in these pieces simply speaks to me.
About the performers
Erin Nizolak is a soprano from Seattle. She earned her Bachelor of Music with a minor in English from Western Washington University, where she performed in choral concerts, art song recitals, opera scenes, and premiered a role in a newly composed operetta. She served as a church cantor, finding in sacred music a space of discipline and devotion. After graduation, her family travelled to South Korea, Germany, and now England. Throughout these travels, and amid the joyful uproar of raising five children, music remained a steady thread. Erin returned to solo performance last October at St Faith’s, Lee-on-Solent. She is grateful for the chance to lift her voice and share in the beauty of live music.
Richard Dewland, a Bristol-born and Birmingham Conservatoire Graduate, works as a freelance musician in Hampshire. As an organist, pianist, flautist, singer and composer, his professional engagements are broad and varied; Head of Music at Boundary Oak school, organist and Director of Music at St Faith’s Church Lee-on-Solent, private tutor, organ recitalist and published composer of Liturgical music.
Deborah Gatland is a violinist with a diverse career including classical, folk and Americana styles. She is a regular player with the Bossard String Quartet, local orchestras and she plays fiddle with the South coast folk band The Courtiers. Deborah studied music with Peter Rhodes whilst he was Head of Music at South Downs College. It was whilst studying under the guidance of Bulgarian violin/viola professor Devorina Gamalova that Deborah discovered a love of Spanish music, namely Sarasate’s Spanish dances. This inspired her to study languages at the University of Portsmouth, alongside her violin studies. After her degree, Deborah spent three years on tour with a leading British folk band, playing major folk festivals in Britain and on the continent. Highlights of this time included performances at Glastonbury and the Skaagen Festival in Denmark.
Bridget Dean is a mezzo-soprano for whom singing has always been a part of life. Fortunate to have supportive music teachers in both primary and secondary schools, she received training and opportunities to perform from an early age. Over the years, she has sung in London at all the main concert venues and with local choirs wherever she’s lived. Never turning down an opportunity to sing, she has sung opera, with folk bands and small chorale groups as well as solo work. She is a Worship Leader for the contemporary service at St Faith’s Church, Lee-on-the-Solent, where she also plays clarinet, recorder and Irish whistles.
