The emotive young American tenor Eric Ferring delivers a moving and ambitious collection of art songs with a chamber music emphasis. In this follow-up release to his acclaimed debut album No Choice but Love (Lexicon Classics), Ferring is joined to great effect by pianist Madeline Slettedahl and the French ensemble Quatuor Agate.
Still in the early phases of his singing career, the Iowa-born Ferring has already performed numerous times with the Metropolitan Opera, and appeared at Santa Fe Opera, the Spoleto Festival and Lyric Opera of Chicago, where he garnered an Emmy Award for his performance in Pagliacci. Ferring has also sung widely in Europe, in such houses as Opéra de Rouen, Opéra de Paris and the Opéra national du Rhin. He also participated in a world tour of Rodelinda with The English Concert.
We have tomorrow is an impressive survey featuring important cycles by Samuel Barber, Gabriel Fauré and Arthur Shepherd, and songs by Florence Price, Johannes Brahms and Amy Beach. Ferring’s sometimes unusual choice of materials shows him to be a musician of wide-ranging taste and interests.
Ferring and Slettedahl, his close collaborator for the past several years, have given the album an original cast by including six works that require string players. The Paris-based Quatuor Agate—Adrien Jurkovic and Thomas Descamps, violins; Raphaël Pagnon, viola; Simon Iachemet, cello—eloquently demonstrates art song’s affinity with small instrumental ensembles.
