CD: Boris Papandopulo: Piano Music
Release date, Summer 2011 

Spring 2011

Thanks to the generous support of the College of Arts & Sciences at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, I am pleased to announce that I have finished recording a CD of piano music by Croatian composer Boris Papandopulo (1906-1991).  It will be released by Albany Records this summer.  You can listen to a sample of Papandopulo's music by clicking here.

CD: Portals and Passages 

Release date: February 1, 2011 

I am pleased to announce the release of my first commercial recording.  This CD features solo piano works by American composer Ethan Wickman (http://ethanwickman.com), and was released on Albany Records.

My doctoral dissertation was published by VDM Verlag in 2008.  This publisher offers print-on-demand, and you can click the book cover to be taken directly to Amazon.com. 

Description

Through an examination of the intersections of women and domestic piano music, the representation of the piano in literature, class and gendered expectations in Victorian England, and Romantic aesthetics, modern audiences can better understand and appreciate Mendelssohn's Songs without Words by considering them in nineteenth-century contexts. Approaching the Songs without Words in these terms reveals mutual influences and illuminates a symbiotic relationship between the Songs without Words and Victorian domestic society: art and life reflected and relied upon each other.

The Songs without Words were extremely popular in the nineteenth century, and the reason for their fame in Victorian England becomes apparent when these piano character pieces are placed within the cultural contexts of the time of their creation. The immense fame and adoration of the Songs without Words in Victorian England was a direct result of their inherent feminine and domestic associations, the same qualities that have contributed to their virtual exclusion from the modern performing repertoire.