The following are resources for further study of the American art of song. This page is hardly an exhaustive bibliography or discography but rather a list of selected items that the compiler has found useful and can recommend to those who wish to pursue this interest. Music libraries and librarians are invaluable to futher research in Ameican vocal music. There are well-known great repositories such as the Library of Congress' Music Division, but smaller institutions may also have unique and useful, even a surprising place, even in Washington for the researcher. By way of example, one of the Festival events is a recital of songs drawn from precisely such a library, that of American University.

Books

A Singer's Guide to the American Art Song 1870-1980.
Victoria Ethnier Villamil. Scarecrow Press, Lanham MD. 1993

Organized by composer, includes brief biographies and bibliographies for each. For the songs, the guide usually provides publication information, poet, keys, voice type, and a description of the song.

Recent American Art Song, A Guide
Keith E. Clifton. Scarecrow Press, Lanham MD. 2008

Continues the survey of the preceding title from 1980 through 2008.

Art Song in America – A Study in the Development of American Music
William Treat Upton. Upton Press. 2007

A personal review of the history of song composition in America from the earliest examples (1750) through the volume's original publication date in 1930.

 

Web

Library of Congress, American Memory, Performing Arts, Music

Sheetmusic collections (Duke University)

Classical Vocal Repertoire (an extensive reprint service)

Recordings

Gerald Finley, baritone & Julius Drake, piano

—appears in recital during the Festival has recorded three excellent CDs of some essential composers in the field of American song:

• Ives. A Song for Anything. Hyperion
• Ives. Romanzo di Central Park. Hyperion
• Barber. Songs. Hyperion

Donald Gramm, baritone & Ned Rorem, piano

Ned Rorem. War Scenes, Whitman Poems, Dialogues. Phoenix

Deborah Voigt, soprano & Brian Zeger, piano

All My Heart: American Songs: Amy Beach, Leonard Bernstein, Charles Tomlinson Griffes, Charles Ives, Ben Moore. EMI

Nathan Gunn, baritone & Kevin Murphy, piano

American Anthem: Songs by Ives, Copland, Barber, Rorem, Bolcom, Scheer, Hoiby, Niles, Gorney. EMI

Joyce DiDonato, mezzo & David Zobel, piano

The Deepest Desire: Songs by Bernstein, Copland and Heggie. Eloquentia France

Renée Fleming, soprano & Metropolitan Opera Orcherstra

I Want Magic! American Opera Arias: Gershwin, Floyd, Bernstein, Moore, Herrmann, Menotti, Barber, Previn Decca

Thomas Hampson, baritone

Song of America: Bernstein, Burleigh, Damrosch, Duk,e Foster, Griffes, Korngold, Naginski, Rorem, Warren, Weill, Wood. EMI