FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Katlyn Morahan | Morahan Arts and Media
katlyn@morahanartsandmedia.com | (646) 378-9386

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Lyric Fest Presents My Favorite Things 
Saturday, June 11, 2022 at 7pm 
Academy of Vocal Arts

Featuring Soprano Jennifer Aylmer and Pianist Laura Ward in Works
by Schubert, Bizet, Irving Berlin, and More

Program Also Includes Peter Hilliard and Matt Boresi’s 
Song Cycle Dead Mall Ballades, Composed for Aylmer;
Plus Karl Hinze and Patrick Spencer’s What A Way To Go,
Commissioned by Lyric Fest

“An irresistible mix of high art and humane feeling…
as entertaining as a well-managed party.” — Broad Street Review

www.lyricfest.org

Philadelphia, PA (May 11, 2022) — Lyric Fest—the only performing arts organization in the Mid-Atlantic region with a primary focus on song in all its varied expression—concludes its 2021-22 season with a program entitled My Favorite Things featuring soprano Jennifer Aylmer together with pianist Laura Ward on Saturday, June 11, 2022 at 7:00pm at the Academy of Vocal Arts (AVA). 

The concert of Jennifer and Laura’s favorite, unforgettable and often humorous songs includes Peter Hilliard and Matt Boresi’s song cycle Dead Mall Ballades, which was composed specifically for Ms. Aylmer, as well as Karl Hinze and Patrick Spencer’s What A Way To Go, commissioned by Lyric Fest. Also on the program are Sebastien Yradier’s El Arreglito, and Vernon Duke’s Just Like A Man, plus works by Schubert, Bizet and Irving Berlin.

All audience members are invited to celebrate with a wine reception in the AVA courtyard following the performance. 

Lyric Fest’s season also includes a concert of Cole Porter works, Anything Goes, on May 17, 2022 at the Moorestown Community Center and on May 18, 2022 at the Academy of Vocal Arts featuring Suzanne DuPlantis, Randall Scarlata, and Laura Ward; and the Brooklyn premiere of Daron Hagen’s The Art of Song on June 3, 2022 at the Brooklyn Historical Society, featuring Meg Bragle, Michael Brofman, Steven Eddy, Gilda Lyons, Rebecca Myers, James Reese, Elisa Sutherland, and Laura Ward.

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Concert Information
My Favorite Things
Saturday, June 11, 2022 at 7:00pm
Academy of Vocal Arts
1920 Spruce Street
Philadelphia, PA 19103

Tickets: $25
Link: https://lyricfest.org/tickets/

Artists:
Jennifer Aylmer, soprano
Laura Ward, piano

Program:
Franz Schubert
     Der Musensohn
     Blondel zu Marien

Sebastien Yradier
     El Arreglito

Georges Bizet
     La Coccinelle

Vernon Duke
     Just Like A Man

Irving Berlin
     Yiddisha Nightingale

Peter Hilliard/Matt Boresi   
     Dead Mall Ballades
          1. Canaries
          2. Drop Anchor
          3. Urban Legends
          4. The Wall
          5. Good King Entropy
          6. With Apologies to Shelly
          7. Centipede
          8. Tree
          9. Epilogue
Composed for Jennifer Aylmer

Karl Hinze/Patrick Spencer
     What A Way To Go
Commissioned by Lyric Fest

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About Lyric Fest
Lyric Fest has been hailed in the press as “An irresistible mix of high art and humane feeling… As entertaining as a well-managed party” (Broad Street Review). Founded in 2003 with the goal of celebrating and revitalizing the art song tradition, it is the only performing arts organization in the Mid-Atlantic region with a primary focus on song in all its varied expression. 

Lyric Fest has produced and presented over 100 distinctly crafted and curated concert programs. Each has featured multiple artists of national and international stature sharing song through theme and story, together with the spoken word. The organization has defined commissioning new works as an integral part of its mission and programming philosophy. To date, Lyric Fest has commissioned an impressive body of more than 200 new American songs from many of the nation’s preeminent composers.

Lyric Fest is run by two of its founders, artistic directors Suzanne DuPlantis and Laura Ward. Known for their excellence and innovation in creating rich, thematic, accessible concerts, Lyric Fest performs throughout the Philadelphia region, and has brought programs to Washington DC; Moorestown, NJ; Wilmington, DE; New Orleans, LA; Pittsburgh, PA; Brooklyn and New York City, NY; and San Jose, CA. Learn more about Lyric Fest at lyricfest.org. 

About Jennifer Aylmer
American soprano Jennifer Aylmer has developed a sterling reputation for her beautiful voice, compelling stage portrayals and impeccable musicianship. The New York Times has hailed her for her, “awesome accuracy,” while The Chicago Sun-Times has recommended that listeners, “bask in the aural delight of Aylmer’s dazzling shifts from regal command to cool insouciance and fatally attractive seduction”.

Recent performance highlights include Ms. Aylmer’s appearances at Opera Theater of St. Louis as Virtù in Monteverdi’s The Coronation of Poppea and performing with Lyric Fest on the Philadelphia Chamber Music Series at the Kimmel Center, in their Tribute to Leonard Bernstein, featuring his daughter, Jaime Bernstein. She also appeared on Carnegie Mellon’s Chamber Music Series in “A Viennese Soirée” featuring guest pianist John O’Conor, and as solo recitalist with pianist Michael Fennelly on the Global Music Concert Series at Hewlett-Woodmere Library’s Gold Hall. Future performances include singing Debussy’s La demoiselle élue with the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic, giving both recital performances with Stonington Opera House (Stonington, Maine), and with CMU’s Chamber Music Series, singing Hilliard and Boresi’s Dead Mall Ballads with pianist Laura Ward in conjunction with Opera Delaware.

Equally accomplished in oratorio, concert, and an especially sought-after recitalist, Ms. Aylmer has been featured with many distinguished orchestras and organizations, including the Utah Symphony Orchestra, with the Mark Morris Dance Group with the White Light Festival, Haydn Orchestra in Bolzano, Italy, Cincinnati Symphony, Orchestra, the Alabama Symphony, Kansas City Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, Oklahoma Symphony Orchestra, Phoenix Symphony, San Diego Symphony, the Grand Teton Festival Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra, the Skaneateles Chamber Music Festival, the Aspen Festival Orchestra, and at the Beijing Music Festival. She sang Eurydice in Gluck’s Orphée et Eurydice with the Oratorio Society of New York at Carnegie Hall opposite Ewa Podles and made her San Francisco Symphony debut singing Bernstein’s Arias and Barcarolles with Michael Tilson Thomas. Ms. Aylmer has also been a frequent guest artist with the New York Festival of Song, and at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum with baritone Randall Scarlata and pianist Laura Ward in their “The Music of Tin Pan Alley” programs and has also been presented across the country as a solo recitalist by the Marilyn Horne Foundation.

Ms. Aylmer is particularly noted for her work in newly composed American music, including her 2005 Metropolitan Opera debut as Bella in the world premiere of Tobias Picker’s An American Tragedy, and appearances with Kyo-Shin-Arts in New York City, and the newly formed contemporary ensemble, NAT 28, in Pittsburgh. Other premieres in the operatic arena include Martha in Kirke Meachem’s John Brown with Lyric Opera of Kansas City, Rowena in Augusta Read Thomas’ Ligeia and as Cynthia Reid in Bernard Rands’ Belladonna both with the Aspen Music Festival, and at Houston Grand Opera, and she created the role of Amy in Mark Adamo’s Little Women. She may also be heard on the 2012 release “The Opera America Songbook” on Kevin Puts’ new composition: You need song.

Other notable roles of Aylmer’s career at the Metropolitan Opera include Papagena in the first world-wide HD broadcast of The Magic Flute, Bertha in Il barbiere di Siviglia and covering roles in Hansel and Gretel, Cenerentola, and in Shostakovich’s The Nose. Some additional highlights of her career include leading roles in Handel’s Orlando, Flavio, Semele, and Acis and Galathea, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Don Pasquale, Die Zauberflöte, Le nozze di Figaro, The Grapes of Wrath, Der Rosenkavalier, The Medium, The Merry Widow, Filthy Habit, The Bartered Bride, Street Scene, Falstaff, The Turn of the Screw, Il Matriomonio Segreto, L’occasione fa il ladro, Rigoletto and A Streetcar Named Desire with such companies as Dallas Opera, New York City Opera, Minnesota Opera, Florentine Opera, Opera Boston, Atlanta Opera, Opera Festival of New Jersey, Orlando Opera, Utah Opera, the Aspen Festival, Opera Theater of St. Louis, Kentucky Opera, Berkshire Opera. Austin Lyric Opera, and Wolf Trap Opera.

A native of Long Island, Ms. Aylmer holds degrees from the Eastman School of Music and Westminster Choir College and was a member of both the Juilliard Opera Center and the Houston Grand Opera Studio Programs. She is currently an Associate Professor of Voice at Carnegie Mellon University, and has been the recipient of many honors and awards, including the Alice Tully Hall Vocal Arts Debut Recital (from the Juilliard School), a Career Grant from the Sullivan Foundation, the Richard F. Gold Career Grant, an award from the National Society of Arts and Letters, and the Catherine Filene Shouse Career Grant from the Wolf Trap Opera Company. 

About Laura Ward
Laura Ward is pianist and Artistic Director of Lyric Fest. As a distinguished collaborative pianist she is known for both her technical ability and vast knowledge of repertoire and styles. Concert engagements have taken her to Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Teatro Colon, the Spoleto Festival (Italy), the Colmar International Music Festival and Saint Denis Festival in France. She has served on the faculty of AlpenKammermusik, The CoOPERAtive Program at Westminster Choir College, The Academy of Vocal Arts, Temple University, Ravinia Festival Stean’s Institute, Washington Opera, University of Maryland, Music Academy of the West and as the official pianist for the Washington International Competition, the Astral Artists Auditions and for the Marian Anderson Award. Laura is pianist on the recently released Daron Hagen 21st Century Song Cycles on the Naxos label and Lineage with her frequent collaborative partner, Randall Scarlata on the Albany label. Laura is also recording artist and editor of song accompaniments for publisher Hal Leonard having co-edited: Richard Strauss: 40 Songs, Gabriel Fauré: 50 Songs, and Johannes Brahms: 75 Songs and recorded over 2000 song accompaniments for Hal Leonard Publishing. These volumes help countless singers and pianists experience, learn and enjoy the art song repertoire and also help introduce a world of art song to many who have had little exposure to classical song. A native of Texas, Laura received her Bachelor in Music degree from Baylor University, holds a Masters in Piano Accompanying at the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music and a Doctorate in Accompanying from the University of Michigan where she was a student of Martin Katz.

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