Category: Concert Reviews
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Portrait Concert of Chamber Music, sponsored by GEDOK
Mannheimer Morgen, May 24, 1991 (Fischer) (translated) – Mannheim, Germany GEDOK: Organization for German/Austrian Women in The Arts “…The American composer, Elizabeth Austin, ….proved that contemporary music can not only be interesting and also aesthetically stimulating but also has the potential to fill concert halls…..One of the most prominent characteristics of her writing is the…
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Premiere of An die Nachgeborenen (To Those Born Later) for SATB Chorus & piano
Mannheimer Morgen, February 8, 1992 (translated) – Mannheim, Germany “…acknowledges with both fury and grief the fate of a deceived generation; it (the work) does not disguise the expression of pain and hurt. This work by no means appears to be embarassed by an asethetic which does not necessarily reject the use of effective means….one heard…
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Concert of Women Composers in Mannheim, sponsored by GEDOK
Rheinpfalz Zeitung, May 28/29, 1994 (translated) GEDOK: Organization for German/Austrian Women in The Arts “…Elizabeth Austin’s Circling for cello and piano began the concert, whose title provided both form and motivic patterns…polystylistic work with exciting interpretations as they set modern fragmentation and neoromantic lyricism, inner strife and a cantabile line against one another….. Mannheimer Morgen,…
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Excerpts from CD review of Wilderness Symphony No. 1
E. Beck, International Alliance of Women in Music JournalWinter, 1998 “..stunning Wilderness Symphony translates Carl Sandburg’s poem…from words into the language of music as a brilliant sound tableau-deep, penetrating, haunting…Austin composes glorious music…a sonorous landscape of individualistic sounds that blend beautifully together…”
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Concert of Women’s Music: Lighthouse I for harpsichord
Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger, January 26, 2000 (translated by Dietrich Möller-Weiser) “…the harpsichordist Fine Zimmermann, in conjunction with the literary scholar, Ingrid Helmke, ..were heard in a gallery concert in Villa Zanders, Bergisch Gladbach. In this concert, literary texts and music complemented one another, as in…the piece for harpsichord, Lighthouse I, by the American composer, Elizabeth Austin.…
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Concert of Rilke Settings for Voice – Nürnberg, Germany
Nürnberger Zeitung, February 25, 2003 Hans Von Draminski (translated) “…into almost Arcadian fields, Renate Kaschmieder and Florian Kaplick abducted their listeners with Austin’s Rilke Lieder, which the composer wrote at the age of nineteen….”
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Review of an all-Austin concert – Goucher College
November 8, 2004 “…distinguished composer Elizabeth R. Austin returned to her alma mater and…attracted an almost full house.” “Austin described her intriguing approach to composition as ‘pantonality, using freely shifting tonal centers, the triadic gestures of eighteenth-century harmonic usage, minus their function. The densities and balance between thematic passages and bridges produce contrasting harmonic idioms…
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Excerpts from Review in Speyerer Morgenpost
Michael Flaksman, cello and Ulrich Urban, piano: December 13, 2004 “…a phenomenal enhancement of this concert was Circling (for cello & piano) by Elizabeth Austin, who lives mainly in The United States but who is also at home in Mannheim. The music describes four stages in a relationship between two people, who are symbolically portrayed by the performers. Short sparkling…
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Excerpts from CD review of “A Falcon Fantasy” (guitar and piano)
by Michael Slayton, International Alliance for Women in Music Journal, Winter, 2005 …signature Austin sonorities…beautifully and carefully crafted, enchanting, if austere…musical journey which is unquestionably rewarding..”
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Piano Concert by Ulrich Urban – Leipzig, Germany
by Leipziger Volkszeitung, July 6, 2007 (translated) “….her “Puzzle Preludes” combine quotes from the classical period with her own variations…through this, one actually dines on the spirit of the famous masters of the past, which is woven seamlessly into the overall concept of these pieces…the grateful public offered lively applause for Urban’s brilliant interpretation…
Elizabeth R. Austin 