Recital: Katerina Skafidas '22 MM, Soprano
NEC's students meet one-on-one each week with a faculty artist to perfect their craft. As each one leaves NEC to make their mark in the performance world, they present a full, professional recital that is free and open to the public. It's your first look at the artists of tomorrow.
Katerina Skafidas '22 MM studies Voice with Jane Eaglen and is the recipient of a scholarship made possible by the Gladys Miller Voice Scholarship Fund.
This performance is open to in-person audiences, and can also be viewed below via livestream.
- Katerina Skafidas '22 MM, soprano
- Jane Eaglen, studio teacher
Johann Sebastian Bach | “Ei! wie schmeckt der Coffee süße”, from Kaffeekantate: “Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht” BWV 211 (1735)
Text
Aria:
Ei! wie schmeckt der Coffee süße,
Lieblicher als tausend Küsse,
Milder als Muskatenwein.
Coffee, Coffee muss ich haben,
Und wenn jemand mich will laben,
Ach, so schenkt mir Coffee ein!
PicanderAria:
Ah! How tastes the coffee so sweet,
Sweeter than a thousand kisses,
Smoother than Moscato wine.
Coffee! I must have coffee!
And if anyone wants to really treat me,
Ugh, just give me some coffee!
Translation by Katerina SkafidasArtists- Kyunga Lee, harpsichord
- Seoyeon Koo, cello
- Yechan Min, flute
Benjamin Britten | Les Illuminations, op. 18 (1939)
Fanfare
Villes
Phrase
Antique
Royauté
Marine
Interlude
Being Beauteous
Parade
DépartTexts
Fanfare
J’ai seul la clef de cette parade sauvage.
Villes
Ce sont des villes! C’est un peuple pour qui
se sont montés ces Alleghanys et ces Libans de rêve!
[Ce sont des villes!] Des chalets de cristal et de bois
se meuvent sur des rails et des poulies invisibles.
Les vieux cratères ceints de colosses et de palmiers
de cuivre rugissent mélodieusement dans les feux. [––]
[Ce sont des villes!] Des cortèges de Mabs en robes
rousses, opalines, montent des ravines.
Là-haut, les pieds dans la cascade et les ronces,
les cerfs tettent Diane. Les Bacchantes des banlieues
sanglotent et la lune brûle et hurle. Vénus entre dans
les cavernes des forgerons et des ermites. Des groupes
de beffrois chantent les idées des peuples. Des châteaux
bâtis en os sort la musique inconnue.
[––] [Ce sont des villes! Ce sont des villes!] [––]
Le paradis des orages s’effondre. Les sauvages dansent
sans cesse la fête de la nuit. [Ce sont des villes!]
[––]
Quels bons bras, quelle belle heure me rendront cette
région d’où viennent mes sommeils et mes moindres
mouvements?
Phrase
J’ai tendu des cordes de clocher à clocher;
des guirlandes de fenêtre à fenêtre; des chaînes d’or
d’étoile à étoile, et je danse.
Antique
Gracieux fils de Pan! Autour de ton front couronné
de fleurettes et de baies, tes yeux, des boules
précieuses, remuent. Tachées de lies brunes, tes
joues se creusent. Tes crocs luisent. Ta poitrine
ressemble à une cithare, des tintements circulent
dans tes bras blonds. Ton cœur bat dans ce ventre
où dort le double sexe. Promène-toi, la nuit en
mouvant doucement cette cuisse, cette seconde
cuisse et cette jambe de gauche.
Royauté
Un beau matin, chez un peuple fort doux,
un homme et une femme superbes criaient sur la place
publique: "Mes amis, je veux qu’elle soit reine!"
"Je veux être reine!" Elle riait et tremblait.
Il parlait aux amis de révélation, d’épreuve terminée.
Ils se pâmaient l’un contre l’autre.
En effet ils furent rois toute une matinée où
les tentures carminées se relevèrent sur les maisons,
et tout l’après-midi, où ils s’avancèrent du côté des
jardins de palmes.
Marine
Les chars d’argent et de cuivre
Les proues d’acier et d’argent—
Battent l’écume,—
Soulèvent les souches des ronces.
Les courants de la lande,
Et les ornières immenses du reflux,
Filent circulairement vers l’est,
Vers les piliers de la forêt,––
Vers les fûts de la jetée,
Dont l’angle est heurté par des tourbillons de lumière.
Interlude
J’ai seul la clef de cette parade sauvage.
Being Beauteous
Devant une neige un Être de Beauté de haute taille.
Des sifflements de mort et des cercles de musique
sourde font monter, s’élargir et trembler comme un
spectre ce corps adoré: des blessures écarlates et noires éclatent dans les chaires superbes. Les couleurs propres de la vie se foncent, dansent, et se dégagent autour de la Vision,
sur le chantier. Et les frissons s’élèvent et grondent, et
la saveur forcenée de ces effets se chargeant avec les sifflements
mortels et les rauques musiques que le monde, loin
derrière nous, lance sur notre mère de beauté,––elle recule,
elle se dresse. O! nos os sont revêtus d’un nouveau corps amoureux.
Ô la face cendrée, l’écusson de crin, les bras de cristal!
le canon sur lequel je dois m’abattre à travers la mêlée
des arbres et de l’air léger!
Parade
Des drôles très solides. Plusieurs ont exploité vos mondes.
Sans besoins, et peu pressés de mettre en œuvre leurs
brillantes facultés et leur expérience de vos consciences.
Quels hommes mûrs! Des yeux hébétés à la façon de la
nuit d’été, rouges et noirs, tricolores, d’acier piqué d’étoiles
d’or; des faciès déformés, plombés, blêmis, incendiés; des enrouements folâtres! La démarche cruelle des oripeaux!
—Il y a quelques jeunes.
[––]
Ô le plus violent Paradis de la grimace enragée!
[––]
Chinois, Hottentots, bohémiens, niais, hyènes, Molochs,
vieilles démences, démons sinistres, ils mêlent les tours populaires, maternels, avec les poses et les tendresses
bestiales. Ils interpréteraient des pièces nouvelles et
des chansons n« bonnes filles ».
Maîtres jongleurs, ils transforment le lieu et les
personnes, et usent de la comédie magnétique.
J’ai seul la clef de cette parade sauvage.
Départ
Assez vu. La vision s’est rencontrée à tous les airs.
Assez eu. Rumeurs des Villes, le soir, et au soleil,
et toujours. Assez connu. Les arrêts de la vie.––
O Rumeurs et Visions! Départ dans l’affection et le
bruit neufs!
Arthur Rimbaud (1854-91)Fanfare
I have the sole key to this savage parade.
Cities
These are cities! These are people for whom
arose the Alleghenies and the Lebanese in their dreams!
[These are cities!] The houses of crystal and wood
move on invisible rails and pulleys.
The old craters circled by massive statues and palms
of copper roar melodiously in the fire. [––]
[These are cities!] The processions of fairy queen
Mabs in red and opaline robes, climb the ravines.
Up there, their feet in the waterfall and bushes,
the stags suckle goddess Diana. Feminine revelers,
suburban Bacchantes sob, and the moon burns and howls.
Venus enters the caverns of blacksmiths and hermits.
Groups of bell towers sing the ideas of the people. From castles
built of bone emerges music unknown.
[––] [These are cities! These are cities!] [––]
The paradise of storms collapses. The savages dance
without ceasing in the festivity of the night. [These are cities!]
[––]
Which nice arms, which beautiful hour will bring me back
to that region from where my sleep and my most subtle
movements come?
Phrase
I have strung the ropes from tower to tower;
the garlands from window to window; the chains of gold
from star to star, and I dance.
Antique
Graceful son of Pan! Around your forehead crowned
in flowers and berries, your eyes, the precious orbs,
move about. Spotted with brown speckles, your
cheeks darken. Your teeth gleam. Your chest
resembles a lyre, the chimes circulate
in your blond arms. Your heart beats in that womb
where the dual sex sleeps. Take a walk, the night
moving gently this thigh, that other thigh,
and that leg to the left.
Royalty
One fine morning, among people very gentle,
a man and a woman gallantly cried through the public plaza:
“My friends, I want her to be queen!”
“I want to be queen!” She laughed and trembled.
He spoke to friends about revelation, about trials past.
They swooned one over the other.
In effect, they became royalty for an entire morning
while the crimson hangings were raised onto the houses,
and all afternoon, while they advanced towards
the gardens of palms.
Marine
The chariots of silver and copper
The bows of steel and silver––
Beat the foam,––
Stirring up the stumps of bushes.
The currents of the moor,
And the immense progressions of the tide,
Spin in whirlwinds towards the east,
Towards the pillars of the forest,––
Towards the columns of the pier,
Whose angle is struck by whirlpools of light.
Interlude
I have the sole key to this savage parade.
Beauteous Being
In front of a snow, a Being of Beauty with lengthy stature.
The whistles of death and the circles of muffled music
make this adorned body arise, broaden, and tremble like a
ghost: the wounds of scarlet and black burst
on the superb flesh. The true colors of life
darken, dance, and they emit around the Vision,
upon the site. And the shivers elevate and growl, and the
frenzied flavor of these effects are charged with the deadly
whistles and the raucous music that the world, far
behind us, launches at our mother of beauty,–– she recoils,
she straightens herself. Oh! Our bones are donned with a new
enamored body.
Oh the ashen face, the crest of horsehair, the arms of crystal!
The cannon on which I must shoot myself through the brawl
of the trees and thin air!
Parade
The fools, very robust. Several have exploited your worlds.
Without needs, and little hurry to apply their brilliant abilities
and their experience to your consciences.
What mature men! The eyes dazed in the fashion of
the summer night, red and black, tricolors, of steel studded with
stars of gold; the faces deformed, heavy, pale, incinerated;
the mischievous hoarseness! The cruel stride of ornate rags!
––There are a few youths.
[––]
O the most violent Paradise of the enraged grimace!
[––]
Chinese, Southern Africans, Bohemians, simpletons, hyenas, gods
of child-sacrifice, old dementias, sinister demons, they mingle
popular maternal tricks, with poses and beastly
tenderness. They would perform new plays and the
“good girls” songs.
Master jugglers, they transform the place and the people,
and utilize magnetizing comedy.
I have the sole key to this savage parade.
Departure
Enough seen. The vision has been encountered in all the skies.
Enough had. Rumors from Cities, the night, and from the sun,
and always. Enough known. The judgments of life.
Oh, Rumors and Visions! Depart into affection
and new noise!
Translation by Katerina SkafidasArtists- Kyunga Lee, piano
Lori Laitman | Emily Dickinson Songs
fromBetween the Bliss and Me (1997)
I gained it so
A Book
I could not prove
from Four Dickinson Songs (1996, rev. 2019)
Will there really be a “Morning”?
I’m Nobody! Who are you?Texts
I gained it so
I gained it so —
By Climbing slow —
By Catching at the Twigs that grow
Between the Bliss — and me —
It hung so high
As well the Sky
Attempt by Strategy —
I said I gained it —
This — was all —
Look, how I clutch it
Lest it fall —
And I a Pauper go —
Unfitted by an instant's Grace
For the Contented — Beggar's face
I wore — an hour ago —Poem 77
A Book
He ate and drank the precious Words —
His Spirit grew robust —
He knew no more that he was poor,
Nor that his frame was Dust —
He danced along the dingy Days —
And this Bequest of Wings
Was but a Book — what liberty
A loosened spirit brings —Poem 1597
I could not prove
I could not prove the Years had feet—
Yet confident they run
Am I, from symptoms that are past
And Series that are done—
I find my feet have further Goals—
I smile upon the Aims
That felt so ample—Yesterday—
Today's—have vaster claims—
I do not doubt the self I was
Was competent to me—
But something awkward in the fit—
Proves that—outgrown—I see—Poem 563
Will there really be a “Morning”?
Will there really be a “Morning”?
Is there such a thing as “Day”?
Could I see it from the mountains
If I were as tall as they?
Has it feet like Water lilies?
Has it feathers like a Bird?
Is it brought from famous countries
Of which I have never heard?
Oh some Scholar! Oh some Sailor!
Oh some Wise Man from the skies!
Please to tell a little Pilgrim
Where the place called “Morning” lies!
Poem 101
I’m Nobody! Who are you?
I’m nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there’s a pair of us–don’t tell!
They’d banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!
Poem 288
Emily Dickinson
Artists- Kyunga Lee, piano
Piotr Ilich Tchaikovsky | Russian Romances
Колыбельная песня, op. 16 no. 1
Я ли в поле да не травушка была, op. 47 no. 7
День ли царит, op. 47 no. 6Texts
Колыбельная песня
Спи, дитя моё, усни! Спи, усни!
Сладкий сон к себе мани:
В няньки я тебе взяла
Ветер, солнце и орла.
Улетел орёл домой;
Солнце скрылось под водой:
Ветер, после трех ночей,
Мчится к матери своей.
Спрашивала ветра мать:
«Где изволил пропадать?
Али звезды воевал?
Али волны всё гонял?»
«Не гонял я волн морских,
Звезд не трогал золотых;
Я дитя оберегал,
Колыбелочку качал!»
Спи, дитя моё, спи, усни! спи, усни!
Сладкий сон к себе мани:
В няньки я тебе взяла
Ветер, солнце и орла.
Apollon Nikolayevich Maykov (1821–1897)
Я ли в поле да не травушка была
Я ли в поле да не травушка была,
Я ли в поле не зеленая росла;
Взяли меня, травушку, скосили,
На солнышке в поле иссушили,
Ох, ты, горе мое, горюшко!
Знать такая моя долюшка!
Я ли в поле не калинушка была,
Я ли в поле да не красная росла;
Взяли калинушку, поломали,
И в жгутики меня посвязали!
Ох, ты, горе мое, горюшко!
Знать такая моя долюшка!
Я ль у батюшки не доченька была,
У родимой не цветочек я росла;
Неволей меня, бедную, взяли,
И с немилым, седым повенчали!
Ох, ты, горе мое, горюшко!
Знать такая моя долюшка!
Ivan Zakharovich Surikov (1841-1880)
based on a Ukrainian text by
Taras Hryhorovych Shevchenko (1814–1861)
День ли царит
День ли царит, тишина ли ночная,
В снах ли тревожных, в житейской борьбе,
Всюду со мной, мою жизнь наполняя,
Дума все та же, одна роковая,
Всё о тебе!
С нею не страшен мне призрак былого,
Сердце воспрянуло снова любя...
Вера, мечты, вдохновенное слово,
Всё, что в душе дорогого, святого,
Всё от тебя!
Будут ли дни мои ясны, унылы,
Скоро ли сгину я, жизнь загубя!
Знаю одно, что до самой могилы
Помыслы, чувства, и песни, и силы,
Всё для тебя!
Aleksei Nikolayevich Apukhtin (1841-1893)Lullaby
Sleep, my baby, hush! Sleep, hush!
Sweet dreams to you beckon:
As nannies, I have for you summoned
Wind, sun, and eagle.
Took flight the eagle homeward;
The sun had set under the water:
The wind, after three nights,
Rushed to his mother.
The mother asked the wind:
“Where did you decide to disappear?
Have you been fighting the stars?
Have you been pushing the waves?”
“I did not drive the waves of the sea,
I did not bother the golden stars;
I protected a child,
I rocked its cradle!”
Sleep, my baby, hush! Sleep, hush!
Sweet dreams to you beckon:
As nannies, I have for you summoned
Wind, sun, and eagle.
Translation by Katerina Skafidas
Wasn’t I just a little sprout in the meadow?
Wasn’t I just in the meadow, a little blade of grass?
Wasn’t I just in the meadow, verdantly growing?
They took me by force, a little sprout, mowed down,
Left in the sun, in the field, withering.
Oh, you, my grief, fate!
If I had known such my share of it!
Wasn’t I just in the meadow, a little guelder-rose?
Wasn’t I just in the meadow, red and blossoming?
They seized the little guelder-rose, cut me down,
And in bundles, they tied me up!
Oh, you, my grief, fate!
If I had known such my share of it!
Wasn’t I just my daddy’s little girl?
Didn’t I grow as my mother’s little flower?
As a slave, poor girl, they seized me,
And to an unloving graybeard, they married me off!
Oh, you, my grief, fate!
If I had known such my share of it!
Translation by Katerina Skafidas
Whether day reigns
Whether day’s reign, whether night’s quietude,
Whether in nightmares or in everyday struggles,
Everywhere with me, filling my life,
All thought there is, only one is vital,
Always about you!
With him, I fear no ghost of the past,
My heart revived again with loving…
Faith, dreams, inspired words,
Everything that is dear to the soul, holy,
Everything about you!
Whether my days be clear, dull,
Whether I soon disappear, losing my life!
I know one thing, that to the very grave
Thoughts, feelings, and songs, and forces,
Always about you!
Translation by Katerina SkafidasArtists- Kyunga Lee, piano