The American Prize National Nonprofit Competitions in the Performing Arts, David (Volosin) Katz, founder and chief judge, is honored to announce the winners, runners-up, and honorable mentions of The American Prize in Vocal Performance—women in art song and oratorio, 2022—The Friedrich and Virginia Schorr Memorial Awards. Congratulations! 

The American Prize in Vocal Performance—Friedrich and Virginia Schorr Memorial Award honors the memory of the greatest Wagnerian baritone of his age, Friedrich Schorr, who commanded the operatic stage between the world wars, and his wife, Virginia Schorr, who taught studio voice at the Manhattan School of Music and the Hartt School of Music for nearly fifty years. The Prize recognizes and rewards the best performances by classically trained vocalists in America, based on submitted recordings.

The American Prize National Nonprofit Competitions in the Performing Arts is the nation’s most comprehensive series of contests in the performing arts. The American Prize is unique in scope and structure, designed to recognize and reward the best performing artists, directors, ensembles and composers in the United States at professional, college/university, community and high school levels, based on submitted recordings. Now in its twelfth year, The American Prize was founded in 2010 and is awarded annually in many areas of the performing arts. Thousands of artists from all fifty states have derived benefit from their participation in the contests of The American Prize, representing literally hundreds of communities and arts organizations across the nation.  Information about the 2022-23 season of contests has been updated and applications are now being accepted. (http://theamericanprize.org)

The American Prize in Vocal Performance—women in opera (professional division),  2022, The Friedrich and Virginia Schorr Memorial Awards

The American Prize Winner: Olga Perez Flora, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque,  NM

Cuban-American mezzo-soprano, Olga Perez Flora, has been lauded by Opera News for her “smoky tones” and “firm, pleasant voice, and lively poise.” She has performed with opera companies and symphonies across the country and internationally and is best known for her sultry Carmen, which she has performed numerous times, including her debut with Amarillo Opera. Dr. Flora was recently featured in Michael Ching’s Completing the Picture which was recorded and filmed remotely during the pandemic, for Opera Company Middlebury.

Opera roles include performances with Opera Company Middlebury/A Streetcar Named Desire (Eunice), Opera Columbus/Madama Butterfly (Suzuki), Arizona Opera/Die Zauberflöte (Third Lady), Opera in the Heights/Don Giovanni (Zerlina), and more. 

Internationally known as a recitalist, Dr. Flora has performed several recitals with companies across the United States, Cuba, and Italy. She has most recently created a Cuban Song Recital named Canciones de mi Isla: Songs from my Island

olgaperezflora.com 

Cuncordu Sas Bator Colonnas perform at Outpost

Cuncordu Sas Bator Colonnas perform at Outpost

Sas Bator Colonnas is a multipart singing group from the Scano di Montiferro, a mountainous region in central Sardinia, Italy. Antioco Milia, Antonio Carboni, Stefano Desogos and Francesco Fodde started singing together in 2002, carrying on the vernacularmultipart singing practice, one of the most representative cultural forms of their village and their island, which is performed by four male singers and called cuncordu.

Different Rivers: Sardinian Hill Country and the DIY Ethos of River of Gennargentu

Different Rivers: Sardinian Hill Country and the DIY Ethos of River of Gennargentu

In the summer of 2014, the Bluesman “River of Gennargentu” released, on his SoundCloud page, three songs of hill country blues, sung in English and played with a technique like those of historical Delta blues artists, recorded in low-quality sound. Within a few months, the web page collected dozens of comments from users who were amazed by this new “discovery” and demanded the real artist’s origin, as-yet-not-specified.

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