Students in the University of Rhode Island’s music department took to the stage last Friday for another weekly music convocation.
The performance began with senior Gia Antolini coming out for her last convocation to perform “Liebestraum No.3” by Franz Liszt on the piano.
After that performance, Antolini stayed on the stage and performed Bach’s “Sheep May Safely Graze,” this time accompanied by sophomore Samantha Shriner, also on piano. The two had previously performed the song for their peers in class.
“I found that days before performance there are things that can be done,” Antolini said. “We felt that we were in a good place.”
Their performance was followed by sophomore soprano singer Carrie Sullivan. She performed two songs accompanied by Nathaniel Baker on piano: the operatic “Fruhlingsglaube” by Franz Schubert and “Romance” by Claude Debussy, the first song of the day performed in English.
Following Sullivan’s performance, Baker stayed on stage and was accompanied by Wyatt Crosby, a double bass player. The two performed the song “Allegro” by Antonio Capuzzi. The song was purely instrumental and was used as a background for Crosby to show his improvement and talent on the bass to his peers. After this, both left the stage and Crosby performed his second song later in the night.
Next came sophomore Sam Giunta, a tenor singer. He performed two songs “Der Musensohn” by Franz Schubert and a more contemporary song in “Not While I’m Around,” a piece from the musical “Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street” by Stephen Sondheim, a famous Broadway composer who passed away last year. Giunta was accompanied by David Gilliand on the piano.
After the show, Giunta was praised by his fellow students, one of whom said that his performance brought a tear to their eye and explained how he performed the songs from the perspective of the characters in the play.
“Taking into context why things are happening in the play itself, for instance, in ‘Sweeney Todd,’ it’s Toby talking to Mrs. Lovett and trying to subtly warn her about Sweeney Todd and who he really is,” said Giunta
He also mentioned that using that, along with taking into consideration the idea of loving and protecting someone were the things that influenced his performance.
Following this, Antolini came out one more time, this time with a violin to perform “Moderato” by Sergei Prokofiev.
The final performance saw Wyatt Crosby return with his bass, this time accompanied by three more students. Guitar players Nick Medlen and Aiden Rogler, and drummer Andrew Dyson joined Corey as they played “You Stepped out of a Dream,” by Nacio Herb Brown.
The performances, which are free to the students, are finished with a Q&A session where students can ask questions to the performers and discuss the songs they performed. Students mostly used the session to congratulate Antolini, who will be graduating.
With the semester drawing to a close, music students will have one more convocation on Friday, April 30th.