Oct. 14-15: Chamber Music Detroit Presents Karen Slack with Pacifica SQ and in Solo Recital, Of Thee I Sing!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 
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 Chamber Music Detroit Presents Soprano Karen Slack 

Karen Slack and the Pacifica Quartet 
Seligman Performing Arts Center – Saturday, October 14 at 8:00pm

Solo Recital, Of Thee I Sing! Songs of Love and Justice
Oakland University’s Varner Recital Hall – Sunday, October 15 at 3:00pm

“Exceptional interpretive instincts and superb vocal technique” – Musical America

www.sopranokarenslack.com
 

Detroit, MI (September 28, 2023) – “Feisty, rich-voiced soprano” (The New York Times) Karen Slack will be a featured performer in two Detroit concerts in October, both part of her debut as guest artist with Chamber Music Detroit during its 80th anniversary season. A recipient of the 2022 Sphinx Medal of Excellence, Slack is known for her fiery charisma and ground-breaking approach to engagement as she continues to amass a body of work that reflects her dedication to premiering works by living composers. Her recitals feature mostly composers of color and demonstrate Slack as a prominent advocate in creating more inclusive environments.

On Saturday, October 14, 2023 at 8:00pm, Slack performs as a guest soloist with the renowned Pacifica Quartet at Michigan’s Seligman Performing Arts Center in a program that includes a new work by Baltimore-based composer James Lee III, written for the quartet and Slack through a co-commission from Carnegie Hall, Shriver Hall, Chamber Music Cincinnati, and Chamber Music Detroit. The Pacifica’s program also includes works by Florence Price, Louis Gruenberg, and the String Quartet No. 15 in a minor, Op. 132 by Ludwig van Beethoven.

On Sunday, October 15 at 3:00pm, Slack will appear at Oakland University’s Varner Recital Hall to perform her critically-acclaimed recital, Of Thee I Sing! Songs of Love & Justice with pianist Casey Robards. Curated by Slack in the summer of 2020, during the height of the pandemic and just after the murder of George Floyd, this deeply moving program was built around Langston Hughes’ raw and powerful, yet hopeful 1938 poem, The Kids Who Die. Musical works include Scott Gendel’s Kids Who Die, written for Slack in 2017, alongside songs by fellow American composers H.T Burleigh, Clayton White, Undine Smith Moore, H. Leslie Adams, Ricky Ian Gordon, Adolphus Hailstork and Jake Heggie. This impactful recital features songs around the themes of love and justice as a reminder that no matter race, ethnicity, or politics, we are all human. Through these soaring melodies and beautiful text, Slack will guide the audience on a musical journey, expression and shared understanding that without love there can never be liberty or justice for all.

Program Details
Chamber Music Detroit Presents Pacifica Quartet & Karen Slack, soprano
Saturday, October 14, 2023 at 8:00pm
Seligman Performing Arts Center | Beverly Hills, MI
Tickets: $10-75
Link: www.chambermusicdetroit.org/2023-24/pacifica-slack

Program:
Florence Price – String Quartet No. 1 in G Major
Louis Gruenberg – Four Diversions for String Quartet, Op. 32
James Lee III – A Double Standard (Co-Commissioned by Chamber Music Detroit)
Beethoven – String Quartet No. 15 in A minor, Op. 132

Chamber Music Detroit Presents Of Thee I Sing! Songs of Love and Justice
Sunday, October 15, 2023 at 3:00pm
Varner Recital Hall - Oakland University | Rochester, MI
Tickets: $10-50
Link: www.chambermusicdetroit.org/2023-24/karen-slack

Program:
Clayton White – Over My Head
Undine Smith Moore – Love Let the Wind Cry… How I Adore Thee
Undine Smith Moore – I Want to Die While You Love Me
H.T. Burleigh – Lovely Dark and Lowly One
Ricky Ian Gordon – My People
Scott Gendel – Kids Who Die
H. Leslie Adams – Prayer
Jake Heggie – “Eleanor Roosevelt: Marian Anderson’s Mink Coat” from Iconic Legacies: First Ladies of the Smithsonian
Adolphus Hailstork (Text by Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.) – Songs from Love and Justice
     i. Decisions
     ii. Love
Traditional – Selection of Spirituals

Karen Slack, soprano
Casey Robards, piano

About Karen Slack
Known for performances that “ripped the audience’s hearts out” (Opera News), Karen Slack is “not only one of the nation's most celebrated sopranos, but a leading voice in changing-making spaces in classical music” (Trilloquy). A recipient of the 2022 Sphinx Medal of Excellence, Slack is an Artistic Advisor for Portland Opera, serves on the board of the American Composers Orchestra and Astral Artists, and holds a faculty position at the Banff Centre.

Highlights of Slack’s 2023-2024 season include her debuts with the New York Philharmonic and two performances as guest artist at Chamber Music Detroit, plus a return to the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, a return to the Festival Internacional de Música Sacra Bogotá in Colombia, and a performance with the Pacifica Quartet in Denver. Slack embarks upon an ambitious new recording project in collaboration with ONEComposer and pianist Michelle Cann, to be released on Azica Records, and debuts her new commissioning project African Queens, an evening-length vocal recital of new art songs by acclaimed composers Jasmine Barnes, Damien Geter, Jessie Montgomery, Shawn Okpebholo, Dave Ragland, Carlos Simon, and Joel Thompson.

Slack has amassed a body of work that reflects her dedication to elevating works by living composers, particularly Black artists. In recent seasons, she has premiered programs including Songs in Flight at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, two separate compositions by Hannibal Lokumbe with the Nashville Symphony and Oklahoma City Philharmonic; Jasmine Barnes’ Songs of Paul with Orpheus Chamber Orchestra at Carnegie Hall; Damien Geter’s Justice Symphony with the Fresno Symphony and The Washington Chorus; and Joel Thompson and Andrea Davis Pinkney's A Snowy Day with Houston Grand Opera. When the pandemic limited live performances, Slack launched an acclaimed digital talk show, #kikikonversations.

She has performed on the stages of the Metropolitan Opera, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Washington National Opera, Scottish Opera, San Francisco Opera, Dallas Opera, Opera Theatre of St. Louis, and many others. She has appeared with the Melbourne and Sydney symphonies, the Bergen Philharmonic, the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, made her Carnegie Hall debut with the Orchestra of St. Luke’s, and performed as a soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra in the world premiere of Hannibal Lokumbe’s Healing Tones led by Yannick Nézet-Séguin.

A native Philadelphian, Slack is a graduate of the prestigious Curtis Institute of Music and the San Francisco Opera’s Merola Opera Program. For more information, please visit www.sopranokarenslack.com

About Pacifica Quartet
With a career spanning nearly three decades, the multiple Grammy Award-winning Pacifica Quartet has achieved international recognition as one of the finest chamber ensembles performing today. The Quartet is known for its virtuosity, exuberant performance style, and often-daring repertory choices. Serving as faculty string quartet-in-residence at the Indiana University Jacobs School of Music for over a decade, the Quartet was previously quartet-in-residence at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and most recently received its second Grammy Award for Best Chamber Music Performance for Contemporary Voices (2020). The Quartet also leads the Center for Advanced Quartet Studies at the Aspen Music Festival and School. For more information, please visit www.pacificaquartet.com.

About Chamber Music Detroit
The mission of Chamber Music Detroit is to bring together inspired musicians and passionate listeners for extraordinary chamber music experiences. Their 80th anniversary season features artists who transcend the quest for excellence, whose vision of music past, present, and future is transforming the field of chamber music in extraordinary ways. For more information, please visit www.chambermusicdetroit.org.

*Photo Credit: Kia Caldwell

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