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Juliana Hall

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http://www.JulianaHall.com

Primarily known as an American art song composer, Juliana Hall (born 1958) has written over 35 song cycles and her commissions include two for song cycles for Metropolitan Opera singers Dawn Upshaw (soprano) and David Malis (baritone). Her music has been performed by more than 100 different performers in major concert halls in Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Colombia, Denmark, England, Finland, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, and Uruguay.

Numerous performances across the United States include concerts at the 92nd Street Y, the Morgan Library & Museum, and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall (New York, NY); the Library of Congress and the Corcoran Gallery of Art (Washington, DC); Ambassador Auditorium and The Colburn School (Los Angeles, CA); the French Library and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, MA); the Kemper Art Museum (Saint Louis, MO); the Strathmore Hall Arts Center (Bethesda, MD); the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art (Hartford, CT); and both the Shubert and McKnight Theaters (Saint Paul, MN).

Joseph McLellan of The Washington Post wrote of Hall’s music,

“By the time she [Dawn Upshaw] sang her encore Saturday at the Library of Congress…she had given a breathtaking display of virtuosity in ‘Night Dances,’ a brilliant cycle of songs to texts by women poets…whose composer, 30-year-old Juliana Hall, used every trick in the book—melodic and half-spoken, tonal and nontonal…to deepen the impact of the texts dealing with night and sleep, to explore the implicit emotions in sounds that ranged from a whisper to a scream, with the piano supplying illustrations and comment and engaging in vivid dialogue.”

Richard Dyer of The Boston Globe reported that,

“[Jayne] West’s recital Sunday afternoon in the French Library with pianist Karen Sauer featured settings by seven composers of some of America’s finest poets, and the results were exceptional…Juliana Hall caught much of Emily Dickinson’s humor and gentle lyricism in seven songs drawn from her letters, ‘Syllables of Velvet, Sentences of Plush.’ A bright, extended tonality and a moving, spare lyricism allowed the texts to breathe. Her first setting of ‘To Susan Gilbert’ was the most genuinely moving music of the afternoon.”

Festival performances include the Fall Island Vocal Arts Seminar (Potsdam, NY); the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival (Norfolk, CT); the Ojai Music Festival (Ojai, CA); SongFest (Los Angeles, CA); and the Tanglewood Music Festival (Lenox, MA). Hall’s music has also been heard in live performances at dozens of American colleges, conservatories, and universities from coast to coast.

Reporting on a concert at Yale University, Philip Greene of the New Haven Register declared,

“Last to be mentioned in this long article, but I think finest of all the works, we were treated to four extraordinarily beautiful ‘Rilke Songs’ by Juliana Hall. With Hall at the piano accompanying soprano Karen Burlingame, the world of Arnold Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire was juxtaposed with the nearly-intact, then gradually distorted, Chopin E-major Etude. These songs were intimate, melancholy, haunting. Not as adventuresome as other works on the program, they nonetheless belong as legitimate modern heirs to the great tradition of German lieder…Strong praise? Perhaps. Let other listeners, even those who thought they hated all that modern stuff, choose the works they enjoyed to listen to more.”

Hall’s song cycle “Syllables of Velvet, Sentences of Plush” is published by Boosey & Hawkes; other song cycles and instrumental works are published by Juliana Hall Music. Several of Hall’s compositions have been recorded on the Albany and Vienna Modern Masters labels, and her music has been widely played on radio, including broadcasts by the BBC (London, UK); NPR (Washington, DC); Radio ArtsIndonesia (Jakarta, ID); Radio France (Paris, FR), Radio Horizon (Johannesburg, ZA); and Radio MonaLisa (Amsterdam, NL).

Juliana Hall studied with composers Martin Bresnick, Leon Kirchner, and Frederic Rzewski at the Yale School of Music (where she earned a Master’s degree in composition), completed her formal composition studies with Dominick Argento, and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1989.

LINKS:

Juliana Hall Music

Musica Kaleidoskopea: Online Interview

Juliana Hall on Facebook

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Juliana Hall on Hello Stage

Juliana Hall on LinkedIn

Juliana Hall on New Music USA

Juliana Hall on New York Women Composers

Juliana Hall on Song of America

Juliana Hall on SoundCloud

Juliana Hall on Twitter

Juliana Hall on YouTube

Sort by

Title	Ensemble Type	Composed	Duration	Media
The Poets	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2015	00:15:00
Evening Sun	Keyboard	2015	00:04:00
How Do I Love Thee?	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2015	00:15:00
Music like a Curve of Gold	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2015	00:08:00
The Bells	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2014	00:20:00
The Holy Sonnets of John Donne	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2013	00:30:00
Rilke Song	Chamber or Jazz Ensemble, Without Voice	2013	00:03:00
The Ballad of Barnaby	Solo instrument, non-keyboard	2011	00:12:00
The Dream of the Rood	Chamber or Jazz Ensemble, Without Voice	2011	00:10:00
Two-Bit Variations	Keyboard	2010	00:04:00
Crucifixus	Chamber or Jazz Ensemble, Without Voice	2010	00:10:00
Orpheus Singing	Chamber or Jazz Ensemble, Without Voice	2010	00:18:00
Upon This Summer's Day	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2009	00:16:00
A Certain Tune	Solo instrument, non-keyboard	2009	00:08:00
Ding Dong Bell	Solo instrument, non-keyboard	2007	00:12:00
Julie-Jane	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2006	00:24:00
Anne's Mother Goose	Keyboard	2006	00:04:00
Seeker of Truth	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2006	00:24:00
Paul Revere's Ride	Keyboard	2005	00:05:00
Suite Creatures	Keyboard	2005	00:05:00
Peacock Pie	Keyboard	2004	00:05:00
Sammy's Mother Goose	Keyboard	2004	00:16:00
North-West Passage	Keyboard	2004	00:05:00
One Art	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2003	00:27:00
Dreams in War Time	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2003	00:20:00
Love's Pilgrimage	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	2000	00:30:00
The Poet's Calendar	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1999	00:24:00
Paradise	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1999	00:23:00
Letters from Edna	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1993	00:20:00
Death's Echo	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1992	00:28:00
The Walrus and the Carpenter	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1992	00:12:00
Peacock Pie	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1992	00:30:00
Propriety	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1992	00:17:00
Fables for a Prince	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1990	00:17:00
Lovestars	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1989	00:09:00
Winter Windows	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1989	00:18:00
Syllables of Velvet, Sentences of Plush	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1989	00:12:30
Bells and Grass	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1989	00:09:00
Night Dances	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1987	00:13:00
In Reverence	Voice, Solo or With Chamber or Jazz Ensemble	1985	00:08:00

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Juliana Hall

In This Moment: Women and Their Songs

From a Woman's Perspective: Art Songs by Women Composers

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Juliana Hall

In This Moment: Women and Their Songs

From a Woman's Perspective: Art Songs by Women Composers