Edward T. Cone Concert Series: Nicholas Phan

In this series, IAS Artist-in-Residence David Lang highlights performances from our musical archives for you to enjoy during your time at home. Today’s selection was performed at IAS in February 2019 as part of the Edward T. Cone Concert Series, and was broadcast on WWFM’s The Classical Network In Concert, hosted by David Osenberg.

David Lang writes: In 1823 composer Franz Schubert changed the relationship of singers to their songs forever, with his masterpiece of storytelling Die Schöne Müllerin. This hour-long series of linked songs tells melodramatically a story of a miller’s apprentice who wanders down the river looking for work. He finds it, he falls in love with the miller’s daughter, she rejects him, he drowns himself in the river. And all the while the piano part accompanying him musically personifies the water—comforting him, supporting him, and ultimately luring him to his suicide. Today’s performance is by the young superstar tenor Nicholas Phan, accompanied by pianist Myra Huang.

***

Music from the IAS is part of the Classical Network In Concert series, broadcasting concerts from the Edward T. Cone Concert Series, presented in Wolfenson Hall at the Institute for Advanced Study for over a decade.

Hosted by David Osenberg. Produced at the studios of WWFM The Classical Network www.wwfm.org