Confessions
Women's voices in song
 
Laura Strickling, soprano
Joy Schreier, piano
 
$15 general admission/$10 students & retirees/Military always free

Laura Strickling brings her "flexible voice, crystalline diction, and warm presence" (The New York Times) to the War Memorial on Friday, November 20 for a program of songs with texts written by and about women. The program previews the album she is developing with her longtime collaborator, pianist Joy Schreier, who will join her in this not-to-be-missed performance. Featured composers include Clarice Assad, Libby Larsen, and Amy Beth Kirsten, among many others. 

Meet the Artists

Praised by The New York Times for her, “flexible voice, crystalline diction, and warm presence,” soprano Laura Strickling has performed at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, Wigmore Hall, Ravinia Music Festival, Tanglewood Music Festival, Berkshire Choral Festival, the Afghanistan National Institute of Music, Trinity Church on Wall Street, Washington National Cathedral, Galapagos Art Space, Tenri Cultural Center, Opera America Center, Philadelphia Lieder Society, Dankhaus Chicago, and the inaugural season of Liederfest in Suzhou, China. A devoted recitalist, she is on the artist roster of the Brooklyn Art Song Society and Vox 3 Collective, and has appeared with Joy in Singing, the Half Moon Music Festival, and SongFusion.
 
An alumna of the Berkshire Opera Company Resident Artist Program, Ms. Strickling’s operatic roles include Countess Almaviva (Le nozze di Figaro), Cleopatra (Giulio Cesare), Mimi (La boheme), Gretel (Hansel and Gretel), Micaëla (Carmen), and Pamina (Die Zauberflöte).   
 
Her past concert performances include Messiah (Handel), Requiem (Brahms), Luonnotar (Sibelius), Ninth Symphony (Beethoven), Les Illuminations (Britten), Requiem (Mozart), Gloria (Vivaldi), Lord Nelson Mass (Haydn), the U.S. premiere of selections from Canti di Pesoa (Riccardi), and the world premieres of Bernard Rands’ Folk Songs and Glen Roven’s The Vineyard Songs and Six Ancient Chinese Songs. Her performance of Mozart’s Mass in C minor and Exsultate Jubilate with the Cathedral Choral Society in Washington, DC was broadcast by classical radio station WETA.
 
New Voices, her recently released recording with the Brooklyn Art Song Society, is available through Naxos Records.
 
Her competition honors include First Prize and “Audience Favorite” prize in the 2015 Rochester Oratorio Society's Classical Idol Competition, First Prize and the “Franz Liszt Prize” in the 2013 Liszt-Garrison International Competition, as well as prizes and honors in the Positively Poulenc! Competition, the Schubert Club Competition, the Liederkranz Competition, the Washington International Competition, the Joy in Singing Competition.
 
Ms. Strickling holds degrees from the Moody Bible Institute (B. Mus. in Sacred Music), where she studied voice under Susan Clark Manns, and the Peabody Institute of Johns Hopkins University (M. M. in Voice).  A Chicago native, she is an avid traveler, having lived in Fez, Morocco, where she studied classical Arabic, and Kabul, Afghanistan, where her husband was the chair of the Department of Law at the American University of Afghanistan. She currently resides in New York City and St. Thomas, U. S. Virgin Islands. Described by Plácido Domingo as an “orchestra at the piano” and hailed as a pianist who “really has it all – fiery technique and a rich, warm tone,” Joy Schreier is praised by The Washington Post as a “responsive accompanist” and an “ideal support” at the piano.  She is credited as “providing much of the evening’s musical nuance,” “so noteworthy that the room seemed to vibrate from her depth and skill,” and “perfection itself…the dream accompanist that a singer hopes to find at some point in one’s lifetime.”
 
Schreier has been presented in recital at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the White House, the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the National Museum for Women in the Arts, the National Portrait Gallery, the Phillips Collection, the Cosmos Club, Strathmore Hall, the Embassies of Austria, Russia, Poland, Anderson House on Embassy Row and recital halls throughout the country.  Internationally, she has performed in England, Scotland, Wales, France, Spain, Italy, Germany, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. 
 
Schreier has served as Assistant Conductor at the Washington National Opera, Keyboard Artist and Vocal Coach of the Cathedral Choral Society, as well as official pianist for the Washington International Voice Competition.  She received her Doctorate in Accompanying and Chamber Music in 2003 at the Eastman School of Music where she was the recipient of the Barbara Koeng Award for Excellence in Vocal Accompanying.  Former teachers include Jean Barr, Ann Schein, and Laurence Morton.