About this Event
proudly presents baritone Aleksi Koponen with pianist Maya Soltan for a free performance featuring vocal music from the Romantic era to contemporary.
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Programme
Modest Mussorgsky - Songs and Dances of Death (1877)
Dmitri Shostakovich - Four Verses of Captain Lebyadkin, op. 146 (1974)
Sally Beamish - Four Songs from Hafez (2007)
Aleksi Koponen is a Finnish baritone who trained in Helsinki and London. Upcoming performances include the title role of Verdi’s Macbeth under the baton of Callum Morton Hüseyin and Tosca’s Scarpia under Orlando Jopling. His recent roles include Orest from Elektra, Father from Hänsel und Gretel, Gunther from Götterdämmerung, Donner from Das Rheingold, Ibn-Hakia from Iolanta, Masetto from Don Giovanni, and Papageno from The Magic Flute. He is one of the founding members of Partimento Ensemble, a baroque quartet with a core repertoire of Bach cantatas. In addition to the ensemble, he frequently sings as a soloist in the major oratorio repertoire. He works closely with pianists Maya Soltan and Jean Bernard Marie, focusing mainly on Russian and German lieder. Concert highlights this season include song cycles of Mussorgsky, Shostakovich and Wagner, as well as Schönberg, Neuwirth, and Schubert’s Winterreise. He particularly champions new music and welcomes any opportunities to sing new work. He has commissioned and given premieres of pieces from several living composers, most recently J Diaz, Matthew Lee Knowles, Alexandre Naoumenko and Jacob Bride. He created the role of Pozzo for 'You Don't Know What Our Twilights Can Do', Will Gardner's new commission for Green Opera.
Maya Soltan is a vocal coach and a pianist. She performs regularly and works as Russian coach at the Royal Academy of Music and National Opera Studio. Maya has accompanied masterclasses with Kiri Te Kanawa, Simon Keenlyside and Kathryn Harries. She has organised song recitals at the Pushkin House and “Oxford and Cambridge” Club among others. She is an organiser of “Essence of Bel Canto” Masterclass with renowned Italian Soprano Nuccia Focile.
Founded in 1948, Westminster Music Library holds one of the largest public collections of sheet music and music books in the UK. We are part of the Westminster and Kensington & Chelsea BiBorough Library Service, and our materials are free to use and borrow.
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This recital is part of our free live music series. Join us every Wednesday at 12:30 for a lunchtime concert.
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Advanced booking is advised, but a limited number of spaces will be available to walk up on the day.
Event Venue & Nearby Stays
Westminster Music Library, 35 Saint Martin's Street, London, United Kingdom
GBP 0.00