Spt. 27: New York Festival of Song Presents NYFOS Next Season Opener, A Perfect Rose: Dorothy Parker Songs

Featuring the World Premiere of Jeremy Beck’s Dorothy Parker Songs,
Plus Witty and Vibrant Parker-Inspired Works by
Danika Lorén, Katie Ernst, Ricky Ian Gordon, and Ralph Rainger 

Sunday, September 27, 2026 at 3:00pm | Theater at 150 W 17th Street, NYC 

“Invaluable … a testament to the variety of ways composers today are treating the voice.”
— The New York Times

“New York Festival of Song’s new music series showed … that the ancient form is alive and very much kicking in the hands of the current generation of practitioners.” — Cadenza

nyfos.org

New York, NY (August 19, 2026) – Celebrated as “one of the longstanding delights of New York’s music scene” (The New York Times), the New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) presents the season's first performance – A Perfect Rose: Dorothy Parker Songs – on Sunday, September 27, 2026 at 3:00pm at The Theater at 150 W 17th Street. Part of the NYFOS Next series, curated by pianist Nathaniel LaNasa to spotlight new contemporary song and rising composers, this program brings the World Premiere of Dorothy Parker Songs, a four-song set by Jeremy Beck.

This musical tribute to Dorothy Parker, the 20th century American poet known for her caustic wit, vividly illustrates how Parker’s writing has inspired composers from the Jazz Age through the present day. Along with Beck’s World Premiere, the program includes Parker-inspired works by Danika Lorén, Katie Ernst, and Ricky Ian Gordon, each refracting the “flapper poet’s” observations through its own modern lens. In addition, the program brings a theatrical interpretation of one of Parker’s short stories, plus a new arrangement of Ralph Rainger’s jazz standard based on a Parker text, I Wished on the Moon. Performers include sopranos Kerrigan Bigelow and Paulina Swierczek, clarinetist Alec Manasse, and pianist Nathaniel LaNasa, who will join Manasse for a performance of Valerie Coleman's Sonatine for Clarinet and Piano. All NYFOS Next concerts offer complimentary refreshments.

A Perfect Rose is the first of three NYFOS Next programs scheduled for this season. The series continues with This Now Naked Life on Sunday, November 15, 2026, and If We Can Love in This Lifetime on Sunday, May 23, 2027, both at 3:00pm at The Theater at 150 W 17th Street.

“Discovering how composers and lyricists experiment in intimate settings is one of the greatest joys of planning a NYFOS Next season,” says Nathaniel LaNasa. “This year, I look forward to three concerts full of songs that synthesize new musical forms from our rich musical inheritance. From Dorothy Parker's punchy aphorisms stylized in jazz idioms and beyond; to leiken's medieval-inflected vocalism and singer-songwriter reflections on finitude; to Cecilia Livingston's fantasias on ancient fragments; this season promises a widely varied, sensuously beautiful tour of brand new song. I am especially excited to introduce our audiences to soprano Kerrigan Bigelow, a NYFOS residency alum; lyricist Michael Kelly, familiar as a beloved baritone on the concert scene; and novelist and mezzo-soprano Indyana Schneider in her American debut." 

The NYFOS Next series is funded in part by a grant from The Aaron Copland Fund for Music; the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature; and by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council. 

Program Information

Sunday, September 27, 2026 at 3:00pm
A Perfect Rose: Dorothy Parker Songs (NYFOS Next)
The Theater at 150 W 17th Street | New York, NY
Single Tickets ($25) and NYFOS Next Series Subscriptions ($60): nyfos.org/nyfos-next

Program:
Jeremy Beck – Dorothy Parker Songs (2026) [World Premiere]
Katie Ernst – Bric a brac (2015)
Danika Lorén – Salome’s Dancing Lesson (2024)
Danika Lorén – Tombstones in the Starlight (2023)
Ricky Ian Gordon – One Perfect Rose (2024)
Ralph Rainger, arr. Beck Vontver – I Wished on the Moon (arr. 2026)
Valerie Coleman – Sonatine for Clarinet and Piano (2018)

Kerrigan Bigelow, soprano

Paulina Swierczek, soprano

Alec Manasse, clarinet
Nathaniel LaNasa, piano

Upcoming NYFOS Next Programs

Sunday, November 15, 2026 at 3:00pm
This Now Naked Life
The Theater at 150 W 17th Street | New York, NY
Link: nyfos.org/nyfos-next

Shannon Keegan, mezzo-soprano
leiken, vocalist
Nathaniel LaNasa, piano

Program:
Daniel Pesca – Terra Incognita
Thomas Kotcheff – songs
Joel Balzun – songs
leiken – Selections from Ars moriendi [World Premiere]

Sunday, May 23, 2027 at 3:00pm
If We Can Love in This Lifetime
The Theater at 150 W 17th Street | New York, New York
Link: nyfos.org/nyfos-next

Indyana Schneider, mezzo-soprano
Michael Kelly, baritone
Nathaniel LaNasa, piano

Program:
Cecilia Livingston and Indyana Schneider – song cycle [World Premiere]
John Glover – After Him

About New York Festival of Song (NYFOS)
Now in its 39th season, New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) is dedicated to creating intimate song concerts of great beauty and originality. Weaving music, poetry, history, and humor into evenings of compelling theater, NYFOS fosters community among artists and audiences. Each program entertains and educates in equal measure. Founded by pianists Michael Barrett and Steven Blier in 1988, NYFOS continues to produce its series of thematic song programs, drawing together rarely-heard songs of all kinds, overriding traditional distinctions between musical genres, exploring the character and language of other cultures, and the personal voices of song composers and lyricists.

Since its founding, NYFOS has particularly celebrated American song. Among the many highlights is the double bill of one-act comic operas, Bastianello and Lucrezia, by John Musto and William Bolcom, both with libretti by Mark Campbell, commissioned and premiered by NYFOS in 2008 and recorded on Bridge Records. In addition to Bastianello and Lucrezia and the 2008 Bridge Records release of Spanish Love Songs with Joseph Kaiser and the late Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, NYFOS has produced five recordings on the Koch label, including a Grammy Award-winning disc of Bernstein’s Arias and Barcarolles, and the Grammy-nominated recording of Ned Rorem’s Evidence of Things Not Seen (also a NYFOS commission) on New World Records. In 2014, Canción Amorosa, a CD of Spanish song – Basque, Catalan, Castilian, and Sephardic – was released on the GPR label, with soprano Corinne Winters accompanied by Steven Blier.

In January of 2022, NYFOS Records issued its first album, From Rags to Riches, with Stephanie Blythe and William Burden. In January of 2025, they released their sixth album, Schubert/Beatles, with Theo Hoffman, Julia Bullock, Kunal Lahiri, and Mr. Blier, which was nominated for a 2026 Grammy Award. The new CD joins NYFOS Records’ burgeoning discography, alongside A Picnic Cantata (2022), the first stereo recording of a hidden gem by Paul Bowles and James Schuyler; Black & Blue (2023), the debut solo album of British-American tenor Joshua Blue collaborating with Steven Blier; Mi País: Songs of Argentina (2023) featuring bass-baritone Federico De Michelis and pianist and Steven Blier; and NYFOS Records: The Singles, Vol. 1 (2024), a wide-ranging compilation drawn from over 20 years of archival material, including tracks featuring Michael Spyres, Justin Austin, and Bernarda Fink. NYFOS Records has reached rapidly growing audiences in over 100 countries, with well over 2.5 million streams to date.

In November 2010, NYFOS debuted NYFOS Next, a mini-series for new songs, hosted by guest composers in intimate venues, including OPERA America's National Opera Center, National Sawdust, the DiMenna Center for Classical Music, the Ann Goodman Recital Hall at Kaufman Music Center. Pianist and new music specialist Nathaniel LaNasa has served as series curator since 2022, when NYFOS Next found its current home, the former Rubin Museum space in Chelsea. 

NYFOS is passionate about nurturing the artistry and careers of young singers, and has developed training residencies around the country, including with The Juilliard School’s Ellen and James S. Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts (now in its 18th year); Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts (its 18th year in March 2026); San Francisco Opera Center (over 20 years as of February 2018); Glimmerglass Opera (2008–2010); and its newest project, NYFOS@North Fork in Orient, NY.

NYFOS’s concert series, touring programs, radio broadcasts, recordings, and educational activities continue to spark new interest in the creative possibilities of the song program and have inspired the creation of thematic vocal series around the world. 

Learn more at www.nyfos.org.

About Nathaniel LaNasa
A consummate collaborator, pianist Nathaniel LaNasa has been praised for his “stormy lyricism” (The New York Times) and his “poise and elegance” (Feast of Music). In 2022, he performed Ricky Ian Gordon’s Intimate Apparel sixty times at Lincoln Center; he returned for LCT’s 2025-26 Amahl and the Night Visitors with Joyce DiDonato. In May 2026, he performed Messiaen's Harawi at Wigmore Hall in London with Simone McIntosh. His recital partners have included Leona Mitchell, Will Liverman, and Gregory Feldmann; his premieres include works by Timo Andres, Matthew Ricketts, Molly Joyce, Iain Bell, and Iván Rodriguez.

Nate curates NYFOS Next at New York Festival of Song, for which critics have lauded his “thematically coherent, well-paced, and musically varied” programs and his “exquisite” piano playing. He also directs Chamber Music at Shelter Rock, a concert series on Long Island. A fierce advocate of new works, Nate has workshopped new operas at the Metropolitan Opera and Chautauqua Opera, and has prepared productions at Columbia's Miller Theater, National Sawdust, Opera Grand Rapids, and the World Trade Center's Perelman Center. Nate has recorded new works for quarter-tone pianos by Dimitri Tymoczko at Princeton, chamber works by Tobias Picker for Tzadik, and a recent release by Dylan Mattingly with Contemporaneous. NYC credits include Alice Tully Hall, Carnegie Hall, MoMA, Brooklyn Art Song Society, and (le) Poisson Rouge. He has also performed at the Musée d’Orsay (Paris), Radio France (Paris), the Seattle Opera House, and Burning Man (Black Rock City). Nate is a graduate of The Juilliard School and the Manhattan School of Music.

About Kerrigan Bigelow
Soprano Kerrigan Bigelow is a recent graduate of The Juilliard School, where she received her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees. While at Juilliard, she was a Kovner Fellow.

An avid performer, Kerrigan has debuted as Gretel (Hänsel und Gretel), Elle (La voix humaine), and Zerlina (Don Giovanni) in recent years.

A champion of new music, Kerrigan has performed with The New Series and AXIOM at Juilliard on many occasions. Highlights include Kurtág’s Kafka Fragments, Pierrot Lunaire, and From The Grammar of Dreams. 

In competition, she has been a regional finalist in both the New England and Gulf Coast Regions of the Laffont Competition. In addition, Kerrigan was a grant recipient of the Gerda Lissner Art Song Competition and an Encouragement Award winner in the IVC competition.

At the heart of Kerrigan’s work is art song. She and her duo partner, Amber Scherer, have given concerts all over New York. Their work focuses on bringing history’s forgotten women to light. Kerrigan has enjoyed the privilege of performing with NYFOS many times, and is thrilled to be joining NYFOS Next for the first time. Later this season, she will make her Sarasota Opera debut as Gretel in Hansel and Gretel. 

About Alec Manasse
New York-based clarinetist Alec Manasse enjoys a lively and varied professional life that spans many different areas of music-making. The son of two New York musicians, Manasse was exposed to a diverse array of concerts and musicians throughout his life. In that vein, Alec plays orchestral, chamber, and solo recitals, and even dabbles in other styles and idioms. In the past year, Alec has played concertos with the Symphony of Westchester and the San Jose Chamber Symphony, the latter being a double concerto with his father, clarinetist Jon Manasse. He has played chamber music concerts with the Manhattan Chamber Players, the Frisson Ensemble, at the Bard Music Festival, Cape Cod Chamber Music Festival, and the St. Barts Music Festival. He has also played orchestral concerts with the American Ballet Theatre, Orchestra of St. Luke's, Festival Orchestra of Lincoln Center, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and the Met Opera Orchestra. Alec continues to remain interested in different styles and opportunities for performance and hopes to add other genres to his professional life in the future. Alec’s initial inspiration to play music occurred as a toddler when he became fascinated with hearing his parents practicing at home. It is this same childlike fascination that characterizes him now in a professional setting.

About Paulina Swierczek
Lauded for her “exceptional voice, cloudless and soaring,” and her “killer side-eye,” soprano Paulina Swierczek is a vibrant storyteller and powerful voice in the operatic and concert repertories. 

Paulina made her Lincoln Center debut in October 2025 singing the soprano solo in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony with the Bard Conservatory Orchestra, alongside mezzo-soprano Stephanie Blythe and baritone Tyler Duncan, led by Maestro Leon Botstein. Concert highlights include Handel’s Messiah with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra, Beethoven’s Choral Fantasy with the Boston Symphony under Andris Nelsons, Szymanowski’s Stabat Mater and Mozart’s Davide Penitente with the Broad Street Orchestra, and Strauss’s Four Songs under Leon Botstein.

A Des Moines Metro Opera Apprentice Artist for the 2024 and 2025 seasons, Paulina covered Senta (Der fliegende Holländer) and Berta (Il barbiere di Siviglia), and study-covered Salome. She also performed excerpts from Der Rosenkavalier, Falstaff, Die Walküre and Der Meistersinger with the DMMO Orchestra and was seen in scenes as Sieglinde (Die Walküre), Vanessa and Elettra (Idomeneo). Paulina made her DMMO mainstage debut as Chocholka in The Cunning Little Vixen in the 2025 season.

2025-2026 season highlights included Beethoven’s Ninth at Lincoln Center, the title role in Act 1 of La Traviata with the Woodstock Symphony, and recitals including Wagner’s Wesendonck-Lieder and Berlioz’s Nuits d’été with Erika Switzer, as well as Messiaen’s Harawi with Nathaniel LaNasa. Paulina is thrilled to open the 2026-2027 season with a return to NYFOS Next, singing the music of her best friend, Danika Lorén, once again with Nathaniel!

*Photos: Kerrigan Bigelow, Nathaniel LaNasa, Paulina Swierczek, and Alec Manasse, courtesy of the artists.