Coker Guest Voice Recital Features Spanish Poetry

Hartsville, SC— The Coker College Department of Dance, Music and Theater presents a guest voice recital by contralto Helen Tintes-Schuermann on Friday, September 7 at 7:30 p.m. in the Hannah Lide Coker Recital Hall of the Margaret Coker Lawton Music Building. Admission is free and the public is invited to attend.

Tintes-Schuermann will perform a selection of Spanish poetry in 20th century song, including selected works by composers Manuel de Falla, Federico Mompou, Xavier Montsalvatge and Fernando Obradors. She will be accompanied by pianist Julio Alexis Muñoz of the Escuela Superior de Canto in Madrid.

An assistant professor in the School of Music at the University of South Carolina, Tintes-Schuermann has performed operatic roles throughout the United States and Europe. Her repertoire encompasses major works of opera and oratorio, as well as German lieder, Spanish song, and New Music. 

Tintes-Schuermann is heard frequently as a concert soloist and recitalist, and she has performed with many world-class artists, including Dame Gwyneth Jones at the Teatro del Gran Liceu in Barcelona. She has sung numerous 20th century works, including European and world premieres, in festivals throughout Europe. In Vienna she appeared as Mme. Giry in “The Phantom of the Opera” and with the Chicago Opera Theater in Phillip Glass’s “Akhnaten.”

In recent seasons, Tintes-Schuermann has appeared in concert with the Augusta Symphony (Verdi’s “Requiem”), the USC Symphony (Handel’s “Messiah”), the Charlotte Symphony (“Amahl and the Night Visitors”), and  with the Bach Ensemble of Naples, Fla., (“Mass in A Major”). She has also performed in concerts of new music with Southern Exposure in South Carolina, as Madame Flora in Menotti’s “The Medium,” as Mme. Armfeldt in Sondheim’s “A Little Night Music,” and in recitals in Chicago and Vienna.

Tintes-Schuermann holds a Doctor of Music from Northwestern University and the Escuela Superior de Canto in Madrid. She releases a CD featuring 20th century Spanish music this fall.

Accompanist Julio Alexis Muñoz is a professor of vocal repertoire in Madrid. He has performed with chamber organizations, in song recitals and as a soloist throughout Europe, North and South America, and the Near East. He has recorded for Sony Classics and E.M.E.C, and he has premiered numerous works by contemporary Spanish composers.

Muñoz studied piano in the Conservatories of Las Palmas and Madrid. He continued his advance training at the Academy Franz Liszt in Budapest, and in 1989 he was awarded second prize in the renowned Competition of Juventudes Musicales in chamber music.

-30-

August 23 , 2007