March daily: Will Liverman
A real life Factotum - and today’s students are listening
Yesterday, after playing a concert in Louisville and celebrating with my treasured partner-in-crime Emily, I tuned in to Baylor’s livestream to hear my student Sylvia’s first doctoral recital. She curated a stunning program on the theme of dreams, and a highlight of the program was Will Liverman’s gorgeous song “A Golden Day,” set to poetry of Paul Laurence Dunbar. I got to play this stunner of a song for baritone Reggie Smith last year, and Sylvia did it beautiful justice with her partner Corinne.
Will is himself a baritone, which you may have noticed since he, like, opened the 2021-22 Metropolitan Opera season (casual) starring in Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut up in my Bones. He played Malcolm X at that same theater last year in Anthony Davis’ groundbreaking opera of the same name, and he’s premiered a bunch of other new operas too while also singing tons of old ones, and he does other stuff with symphonies and sings song recitals and is a killer pianist and oh did I mention that he also wrote an opera, Factotum, that premiered in Chicago in 2023?
Will is an incredible example of a 21st century artist, and people like him are on my mind when I consider the idiotic and cruel anti-DEI actions of the last weeks. Will’s a top-notch singer of and in multiple genres, and a composer, and a video producer, and a curator, and a mentor and colleague of finest quality. Not very many have his combination of skills, or reach his level of performance. And the specifically Black stories he’s been part of - the Black characters he’s portrayed, the Black narratives he’s brought forward as a writer, curator, and performer - have been a huge part of his success. He was doing well before them, and then his career exploded. It’s great that he’s sung Papageno and Mercutio and Marcello and Figaro on big stages, but he would not be where is now just through those roles. The classical music industry’s commitment to the “DEI” projects (however imperfect, reluctant, or shallow) afforded this brilliant performer and others a chance to be heard and seen without being consciously or unconsciously pre-compared to some past idea of what opera or song is supposed to look like.
Now mid-career, Will has already given so much back to the profession, his songs showing up in student recitals and leading their paths forward. His latest project honors women in our profession and includes a whole community of collaborators. He’s doing it right.
(I know this post is short, and in order to do one every day I fear they will have to be. But follow the links if you don’t already know the artist of the day, and enjoy finding out more!)
And if you’re wondering why I didn’t link to Two Black Churches, it’s because I’m saving that for a later post :)
thanks for reading.