A Roasted Swan, a Requiem, and the Spring Ahead
This spring has already been a whirlwind — and we're only getting started. I kicked off March with my first-ever visit to Boise, performing Carmina Burana with a brand new audience, and the weeks ahead are filled with music that means a great deal to me. From Bach to Mozart to Haydn, I keep finding the same thing in every one of these works: the most personal moments live inside the biggest sound.
Photo courtesy of the Boise Philharmonic
This Season So Far and What’s Ahead
Earlier this month, I visited Boise to bring my Roasted Swan to the Boise Philharmonic for Orff’s Carmina Burana. What an experience! Carmina is a roller coaster — the biggest fortissimos and the most intimate pianissimos, hilarity and beauty, all rolled into one piece. Since the tessitura for the tenor sits unusually high (and I believe singers must consistently prepare like athletes), I continue to fine-tune this particular role so that the struggle comes not from a poor attempt at singing the role, but from my dramatic telling of the story of the swan being roasted over the spit! The Boise audience brought incredible energy, and I left feeling the way I always hope the audience feels after Carmina: exuberant!
This Carmina was on the heels of an incredible performance with the Cathedral Choral Society at the Washington National Cathedral, where my performance of the Swan was lauded for my “vocal warmth and intensity paired beautifully with his gift for comic timing clearly evident in “Olim lacus colueram”.” - Jeannette Mulherin, MDTheatreGuide. OperaWire (Arnold Saltzman) also chimed in with: “Everyone loved tenor Brian Giebler who provided a touch of humor in the play when he sang as the ‘roasted swan:’.”
Later this week, I’ll be joining Concerts at St. Ignatius in New York City for Bach’s St. Matthew Passion on March 29. As Evangelist, the Passions are not pieces you can just show up for. You have to return to the text, return to the music, and meet it where you are now. I love growing with the works both vocally and emotionally each and every time I get the opportunity to revisit them as Evangelist.
And then there’s Bach’s B Minor Mass with The Sebastians on April 28 in New York. By the time the tenor sings the Benedictus toward the end of that work, it’s been a lot of notes, a lot of fugues, and a lot of excitement. And then this intimate, tranquil aria arrives: a personal reflection in the middle of something enormous. That’s one of the great gifts for the tenor in this work: finding the intimate inside the monumental.
Returning to Colorado and Austin this April
I’m very excited to return to the Colorado Symphony this April, this time singing Haydn’s Mass in Time of War. I can’t think of a more appropriate work right now.
It’s an interesting program — a collection of different pieces focusing on War and Peace surrounding the Haydn — with Mass in Time of War at the heart of it. When I’m on stage performing that piece, I’m always listening for the dissonance and the tension. When you find it and lean into it, that’s when you find the most rewarding resolve. It’s therein that one can find peace.
Maybe through the music, we can find ways of listening to each other differently. Ways of being there to support each other. I think our world needs this more now than ever, and I believe music can be part of how we get there.
Prior to Denver, I will be returning to the Austin Symphony this season after an exhilarating Carmina Burana last season. This time it’s for Mozart’s Requiem, and what I’m hoping lingers after the final chord is something simple: inner peace.
What I've Been Exploring: A Note on Listening
Being a dad, there's not a lot of silence in my life these days. My son is nearly 2, endlessly curious about everything, and he's changed the way I hear the world. I watch him stop and listen to sounds around him (“What’s that sound?”), and it's made me do the same. In the rare quiet moments, I'm paying more attention: hearing things I would have missed before.
He's teaching me so much without knowing it. And I wonder what I'm teaching him that will stick! I hope that when he's old enough to come to a performance of mine — whatever it is, whenever it is — he sees that my work is my passion, not just my job. And I hope that inspires him to find his own passion. Not just something he's good at, but something he's truly passionate about. Something that gives him the same drive and determination that this career has given me.
That's what I want for him — and honestly, that's what I want for anyone reading this: a life where the work and the passion coexist and live in harmony together.
With gratitude,
Brian
View all of my upcoming engagements.