BRITANNICA, Staniland's CANADIAN SONGBOOK and More Set for Brooklyn Art Song Society's 2015-16 Season

The 2015-2016 season has everything audiences have come to expect from Brooklyn Art Song Society- first-rate performances from the finest young interpreters of song, innovative and ambitious programing, and intimate, unique venues in Brooklyn and beyond.

BASS begins the season with Britannica, a six-concert survey of 400 years of British song. Starting with John Dowland and Henry Purcell in the Opening Night Benefit Concert (September 18th, 2015) Britannica captures the vast English cultural heritage. Highlights include In Memoriam: Songs of the Great War (November 6th, 2015) an innovative collaboration with the Classical Theatre of Harlem featuring monologues from Shakespeare's plays alongside musical settings (February 14, 2016), and the American premiere of Harrison Birtwistle's Songs from the Same Earth (January, 22, 2016).

The season continues with BASS's innovative new music series In Context on April 2, 2016. This year's In Context composer is Scott Wheeler, who curates a program of his own works alongside those of Johannes Brahms, Robert Schumann, Virgil Thomson, and Judith Weir. BASS honors the composer Fanfare called "one of the freshest American voices."

Next, BASS concludes the epic Hugo Wolf Project, its multi-year survey of the complete songs of Hugo Wolf, on April 29th, 2016. Featuring the composer's lively earlier works, this concert brings the grand total of Wolf's songs performed by BASS to an astonishing 335 over six seasons.

Finally, BASS closes the 2015 -2016 season on May 22nd, 2016 with its third commissioned work, The Canadian Songbook by Andrew Staniland. Mr. Staniland, who's music has been called by the New Yorker "alternately beautiful and terrifying", takes his texts for this concert-length song cycle from the brutally honest, strange, and powerful poetry of Robin Richardson, one of Canada's most esteemed young poets.

In addition to its regular season BASS has several special bonus events. BASS continues its partnership with the Deutches Haus at NYU with two concerts: a program of British poets in German translation, including works by Schubert, Schumann, and Strauss (October 6, 2015), and a retrospective of the Hugo Wolf Project, featuring the performers favorite songs and a conversation with the audience (April 22, 2016). Also, BASS returns to Bargemusic on October 22nd, 2015 to celebrate Ned Rorem's 92nd birthday in a concert featuring the American master's songs and rarely heard cantata King Midas alongside works of three of his most acclaimed students: Daron Hagen, Russell Platt and Kurt Rohde.

BASS also continues expanding its reach nationally. In November BASS tours Missouri with concerts at Truman State University (November 9, 2015) and a special Veteran's Day concert at the National World War I Memorial and Museum in Kansas City (November 11, 2015). Also BASS returns to Portland, Maine on May 7, 2016 to present works by James Kallembach, Lowell Liebermann, and Robert Schumann.

This season features over 35 artists, some of the finest young interpreters of song ,including many returning favorites such as soprano Laura Strickling, tenor Dominic Armstrong, baritone Michael Kelly and pianist Spencer Myer. In addition, five artists will make their BASS-debut this season: baritones Steven Eddy, Jarett Ott, and Sidney Outlaw, and Jorell Williams, and pianist Richard Valitutto. For the complete list of programs and performers see the attached concert schedule or visit www.brooklynartsongsociety.org.

The Brooklyn Art Song Society (BASS) will enter its sixth season of first-music making in the Fall of 2015, having earned a reputation as one of the preeminent organizations dedicated to the vast repertoire of poetry set to music. The New York Times called BASS "a company well worth watching" and Voce di Meche hailed, "as long as BASS is around we do not need to worry about the future of art song in the USA." BASS's innovative programming is epic in scope yet presented in intimate settings. Past highlights have included performances of the complete songs of Charles Ives and Henri Duparc, a festival of works from Franz Schubert's last year, a five-concert survey of the songs of Les Six, and an ongoing project to present the complete lieder of Hugo Wolf. Committed to keeping art song relevant in our time BASS has collaborated closely with important living composers such as Tom Cipullo, Herschel Garfein, Daron Hagen, Libby Larsen, Lowell Liebermann, James Matheson, Scott Wheeler and Yehudi Wyner, and has commissioned works from up-an-coming composers Michael Djupstrom, Marie Incontrera and Michael Rose. In May 2015 BASS released its first album, New Voices, on Roven Records, which debuted at number one for new releases in Opera and Vocal on Amazon.com and in the top 10 on the Billboard Traditional Classical chart. The 2015-16 season includes Britannica, a six-concert celebration of British song from Dowland to Birtwistle, the conclusion of The Hugo Wolf Project, and the world-premiere of Andrew Staniland's Canadian Songbook (BASS/Casement Fund Song Series co-commission). On top of monthly concerts in Brooklyn, BASS will travel to Kansas City, MO and Portland, ME. In the summer BASS is the Fonzaley Resident Ensemble at the Sembrich in Bolton Landing, New York and the ensemble in residence at the Lake George Music Festival. This season features over 30 of the finest young interpreters of art song.