Shades of Pink

Song in the City is celebrating LGBT History Month in February with a series of Thursday lunchtime free recitals at St Botolph without Bishopsgate church hall. The four recitals are being given by singers and actors from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, accompanied by Gavin Roberts who is Song in the City's artistic director. There are three themed recitals Songs from the Closet (12 February 2015) which tells the story of composers who expressed their sexuality even though in the closed, Strange Bedfellows, Queer Collaborations (19 February) is full of music and poetry which was a collaboration between lovers or close friends in same-sex relationships. And the final concerts, Glitter and be Gay (26 February) charts a 20th and 21st century struggle of homosexual composers and poets leading to eventual 'out and proud' emergence and recognition, including one of my own songs..

Roberts has cast his net wide for the songs and there will be music by Schubert, Tchaikovsky, Hahn, Ethel Smyth, Amy Woodford-Finden, Britten, Mewton Wood, Barber, Verlaine, Menotti, Tippett, Poulenc, Cole Porter, Malcolm Williamson, Judith Weir, Ned Rorem, Aaron Copland, Jonathan Dove, Stephen Sondheim. My AE Housman setting He would not stay for me will be performed in the 26 February recital.

There is a further set of recitals in March exploring the world of the Parisian salon. Full information from the Song in the City website.