Lisa Solomon is a soprano with a passion for early and less-performed music. Based in Bremen, Germany, she holds a Masters of Music in historical singing performance from the Hochschule für Künste Bremen, where she studied with Prof. Benno Schachtner and Bettina Pahn. Drawing on her interest in medieval music and literary studies, she wrote her master’s thesis on the three lais (a long and highly varied medieval song form) by 14th-century poet-composer Guillaume de Machaut that he wrote into his narrative works.
Lisa subsequently completed a masters in Music of the Middle Ages at the Folkwang University of the Arts in Essen, Germany, studying with Benjamin Bagby (Sequentia), Prof. Dr. Stefan Klöckner, and Dominik Schneider. She also holds a B.A. in Comparative Literature from Stanford University.
Lisa’s current focus is on the development and performance of unique concert programs centered around early music repertoires. In addition to her musical projects and medieval studies, Lisa currently teaches voice and directs the children’s choir at the Musikschule Wilhelmshaven. In the summers, she works as a staff member at the Amherst Early Music Festival, the largest presenter of early music workshops in the United States. In 2024, she co-taught the festival’s auditioned Medieval Program with Benjamin Bagby and Larry Rosenwald, focusing on repertoire from the Codex Las Huelgas.
Photos
VIDEOS
From the program “Sweet Sirens,” performed April 27, 2023 in Gerhard-Marcks-Haus, Bremen.
From the program “Kansiones de Shelomó,” with Johannes Festerling. Recorded in Tonstudio Tessmar, Hannover.
Masters Recital (excerpts), April 2021, HfK Bremen (performed under restrictions due to Covid-19)
(3:46) M.A. Charpentier, “Sans frayeur dans ce bois” (1680)
Projects
Kansiones de Shelomó
with Johannes Festerling, Theorbo/Baroque guitar
A concert program that brings together two contrasting expressions of Jewish musical culture. On the one hand are sacred motets in Hebrew by Salomone Rossi (c.1570-1630) from his 1623 collection Hashirim asher lish’lomo (“The Songs of Solomon”), drawing on historical practices of intabulation and diminution to turn polyphonic vocal works into solo songs for voice and lute. Interspersed with these pieces are traditional songs of the sephardim, descendants of Jews who were expelled from Spain in the late 15th century. Sung in Judeo-Spanish and accompanied with baroque guitar, these folksongs provide a secular counterpoint to the Rossi motets.
Funded by the German Federal Commissioner for Culture and Media as part of the NEUSTART KULTUR initiative.
Sweet Sirens
with Johannes Festerling, Theorbo
Thomas Fields, Viola da gamba
Lilli Pätzold, Cornetto
An interdisciplinary concert program highlighting female composers and poets from seventeenth-century Europe. The program brings together songs and poems in Italian, German, and English in a narrative arc larger than each individual piece. Tied together through themes of love, despair, reverence, and faith, the works reflect and enrich each other, moving seamlessly between recited and sung text. Composers include the much-performed Barbara Strozzi and Francesca Caccini, as well as the lesser-known Lady Mary Dering, Duchess Sophie-Elizabeth, Settimia Caccini, Claudia Sessa, and Lucrezia Orsina Vizzana. Poets include (among others) Isabella Andreini, Sibylle Schwarz, Aphra Behn, Lucrezia Marinella, and Sarra Copia Sulam.
Funded with a #MusikerZukunft grant from the Deutsche Orchester-Stiftung and by the German Federal Commissioner for Culture and Media as part of the NEUSTART KULTUR initiative.
En approchant:
Songs of the French Baroque
with Johannes Festerling, Renaissance Lute / Theorbo
A concert program of French airs de cour from the 17th century. Works by Lambert, Guédron, Charpentier, Le Camus, Moulinié, and Bataille.
More information coming soon.
EnGagements
Sunday, October 6, 2024 | 3:00 PM | Heinrich-Schütz-Haus, Weißenfels
Sweet Sirens: Musikalische und literarische Schätze der Zeitgenossinnen von Heinrich Schütz
Heinrich Schütz Musikfest 2024
https://www.xn--schtz-musikfest-1vb.de/ger/veranstaltungen/termine/2024_HSM/15_5_Sweet-Sirens-WSF.php
Recent engagements
July 7-14, 2024 | Amherst Early Music Festival
Instructor: Medieval Project with Ben Bagby (director) and Larry Rosenwald
Codex Las Huelgas: A Medieval Treasury for Singers
Sunday, April 7, 2024 | 5:00 PM | Kulturkirche Wilhelmshaven
En approchant: Songs of the French Baroque, with Johannes Festerling (lute/theorbo)
Sunday, February 4, 2024 | 6:00 PM | Ev. Stadtkirche Remscheid
Fons Luminis: Gesänge aus dem Codex Las Huelgas
Masterabschlusskonzert des Studiengangs “Musik des Mittelalters”, Folkwang Universität der Künste
Sunday, October 15, 2023 | 7:00 PM | Unser Lieben Frauen Kirche, Bremen
St. Paul op. 36, Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy,
Bremer Rathschor (contract soprano), directed by Antonius Adamske
September 3, 2023 | 6:00 PM | Lutherkirche Hamburg-Bahrenfeld
Textur des Windes, with Turnstone Society
September 2, 2023 | 7:00 PM | Heiligen-Geist-Kirche, Barmstedt
Textur des Windes, with Turnstone Society
Lisa Solomon, soprano 