Q: What’s this going to be like?

A: I will sing about an hour’s worth of classical solo music, accompanied on the piano by Beth Kirchhoff. The music will be art songs, which are classical settings of poems in English, French, German, Italian. Spanish and Russian, by the poets who are arguably the most towering figures of their respective languages. We will not have sets or costumes, but we will do what we can to be interesting to see as well as to hear. The songs will be grouped into sections, separated by short breaks, with a longer intermission halfway through. (It’s usual for the audience to applaud only at the ends of sections.)

We are also going to experiment with supratitles, where we will project English translations of the songs as they are sung. We will be interested in finding out from audience members whether they are helpful.