Art Songs Exploring the Passing of Time and Season

Soprano Julia Ebner, mezzo-soprano Danan Tsan, and pianist Sar-Shalom Strong present Art Songs Exploring the Passing of Time and Season. The trio will present music by Felix Mendelssohn, Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel, and Edward Ruchalski & Elizabeth Twiddy.

Central New York native, Julia Ebner is an active classical singer who has been praised for her “vocally and dramatically superb,” performances.

Ms. Ebner’s operatic credits include the title roles in Romeo et Juliette, L’incoronazione di Poppea, The Merry Widow, Hansel and Gretel and Princess Ida. She has also appeared as Donna Anna in Don Giovanni, Marguerite in Faust, Violetta in La Traviata, Lucy Brown in Kurt Weill’s The Threepenny Opera, Hodel in Fiddler on the Roof, and Mrs. Hayes in Susannah, Olga in La Grand-Duchesse de Gérolstein, Stella in A Streetcar Named Desire, Giulietta in I Capuleti e I Montecchi Musetta in La Boheme, Atalanta in Serse, Miss Silverpeal in The Impresario, Belin da in Dido and Aeneas, Gianetta in The Gondoliers, Madeline/Isabelle in The Face on the Barroom Floor, Micaela and Frasquita in Carmen and The First Lady and Pamina in Die Zauberflöte, Amitta in Der Geduldige Socrate, Mozart and Donna Anna in The Classical Style, First Wood Sprite in Rusalka, and Monica in The Medium. Ms. Ebner originated the role of Maud in Pushed Aside: Reclaiming Gage and Amara Bliss in the world premiere of Robert Paterson’s Cocoa Cantata. She has taken the stage for companies including The Santa Fe Opera, The Florida Grand Opera, Opera North, Virginia Opera, Winter Opera St. Louis, Opera San Antonio, Ash Lawn Opera, St. Petersburg Opera, Bel Cantanti Opera, Green Mountain Opera Festival, Syracuse Opera, Opera in the Heights, The Tri-Cities Opera, Amherst Early Music Festival, Oswego Opera Theater, and The Charleston Chamber Opera. Ms. Ebner has also had the honor of singing in the chorus of the Metropolitan Opera for productions of Fidelio, Otello, and Turandot.

A versatile concert performer as well, Ms. Ebner’s credits include the Brahms Requiem, Vaughan Williams’s A Sea Symphony and Dona Nobis Pacem, and Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Handel’s Messiah, Mahler’s Rückert Lieder and Bach’s Magnificat with Symphoria. She has also sung as the soloist for Haydn’s Last Seven Words of Christ in DeWitt, New York, Mozart’s Requiem in Binghamton, New York, and Haydn’s Missa Brevis in F at Syracuse University. She has also sung the soprano solos in Mozart’s Missa Brevis in F and Vesperae Solennes de Confessore with the Syracuse Masterworks Chorale. Recognized for her talent for early music, she has frequently performed as the soprano soloist for the Binghamton Baroque Ensemble. She received her Masters in Music from Binghamton University where she was the soloist in Orff’s Carmina Burana, and Bach’s Magnificat.

Ms. Ebner received her Bachelors in Music from Syracuse University where she was also the recipient of the Moore Opera Award, the Jessie Gaul Vocal Music Scholarship and the Ernst Bacon Vocalist Award. Other honors have included the Stuart & Jeanne Wilson Scholarship from Tri-Cities Opera and a Richard F. Gold Career Grant from the Shoshanna Foundation. Ms. Ebner was the 2007 winner of the Helen Boatwright Award, and was a 2017 finalist for Opera Ithaca’s Edward M. Murray Voice Competition, a 2008 finalist for the Franco-American Vocal Awards and a 2006 and 2009 finalist for the Sara Tucker awards. She also received the Female Young Artist Award in 2009, from Opera North as well as a 2011 Encouragement Award from the Metropolitan Opera National Council and the 2011 Campbell Wachter Memorial Award from the Santa Fe Opera.

Ms. Ebner currently teaches music for LeMoyne College, and Syracuse University.

Danan Tsan is a versatile performer with a background in classical singing. When she isn’t singing the alto solos in Handel’s Messiah or recitaling, she is performing cabarets and new music in the Syracuse area. Tsan was in a chorus in the military (yes, she survived basic training) and was a featured soloist with Symphoria for their holiday concerts.

Tsan has appeared with Syracuse Opera as Charlotte in Sondheim’s A Little Night Music, Aldonza/Dulcinea in Darion and Leigh’s Man of La Mancha, with Oswego Opera as The Mother in Menotti’s Amahl and the Night Visitors and Maddalena in Verdi’s Rigoletto, and starred as Fantine in the Baldwinsville Theatre Guild’s production of Les Misérables. Tsan has been featured with Symphoria, The Buffalo Philharmonic Pops Orchestra, The Cincinnati Pops, and The Naples Pops Orchestra with Erich Kunzel. With the Society for New Music, she plays the lead role in Persis Vehar’s Pushed Aside (an opera about the life of abolitionist and women’s suffragist Matilda Joclyn Gage), the role of Sorcerer, in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice, and as Daughter, in Michael Torke’s Strawberry Fields. She continues to be featured on recital and cabaret series around Central New York, including the OASIS series, and the Utica College Jackson Lunch Hour Series.

Along with being an accomplished classical singer, Danan has many original pop songs featured in films in America and Japan and her voice has been featured on many other songs for films. For instance, Danan sang the theme song to a full-length feature film called King Lee (CinemaNational) and was the voice behind many of the songs included in the indie hit Chillicothe (Blue Yonder Films). She recorded an album with songwriter and collaborator, James Durham, under the name of Aeolian May, and the song Way Down South runs during the closing credits of the sci-fi film 95ers: ECHOES (Durham Films).

While living in New York City, Danan was in the ensemble for Timmy the Great with Savion Glover (off-off Broadway), lead her own award-winning band (Top 25 albums of 2007 Indie-Music.com) and sang back-up for Chris Isaak and Wynona Judd.

She holds degrees from Southern Methodist University (BM, ‘97) and The Eastman School of Music (MM ’00).

Danan lives in Syracuse with her husband and 3 children.

Sar-Shalom Strong performs extensively as both a soloist and a collaborative musician, averaging around 30 concerts per year. He is core pianist for The Society for New Music and has premiered many new compositions in that capacity, some of which are available on Innova Records.

In 2016, Mark Records released eight recordings Strong made with clarinetist and saxophonist Ronald Caravan, recordings that are available through Naxos. Strong was orchestral keyboardist for the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra for almost 10 years, and has been a soloist with Symphoria, Utica Symphony and the Hamilton College Orchestra. Strong has frequently performed at the Skaneateles Festival and the Walker Lecture Series, in Concord, N.H.

In addition to performing, Strong has extensive teaching experience with a pedagogical lineage that can be traced back to Liszt and Beethoven. He is active as an adjudicator for festivals and competitions, and as a vocal coach. He holds degrees from Knox College and Syracuse University, joining the Hamilton College faculty in 2001.

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CMM (Civic Morning Musicals) exists to support classically trained musicians and their audiences throughout the Central New York region. It is a non-profit, volunteer-run organization, which produces more than 30 concerts a year and sponsors activities for young musicians.