Join us for this very special celebration in concert showcasing the world premiere of a new composition of eleven songs based on the letters of Willa Cather. The Omni Quartet and American mezzo-soprano Nancy Maultsby perform the song cycle composed by Richard Stout on April 23, from 3-5 p.m., at the Ethel S. Abbott Auditorium, Sheldon Museum of Art. The concert is free and open to the public.

The Cather Archive of the University Libraries and the Cather Project in the UNL English Department commissioned Stout to compose these songs to celebrate the completion of the digital humanities project “The Complete Letters of Willa Cather.”

The first hour of the concert features the Omni Quartet playing two pieces of work composed by Clint Needham and Caroline Shaw. The second hour of the concert will be the world premiere of “Songs of Correspondence,” the song cycle of eleven songs based on Cather letters with American mezzo-soprano Nancy Maultsby joining the Omni Quartet.

Richard Stout received his musical training at Rice University and The Curtis Institute of Music. Self-taught as a composer, his music combines traditional forms and idioms with sounds and techniques from current everyday American life. Drawing on his experience in repertoire as a performer, Stout frequently writes music with a strong narrative sense and appropriates styles from Baroque to Pop in his musical storytelling. As a trombonist, Richard has performed in concert halls around the world as a member of The Cleveland Orchestra and is an active chamber player as a founding member of Factory Seconds Brass Trio. Mr. Stout is a faculty member at Baldwin Wallace University and resides in Moreland Hills, Ohio with his wife, pianist Christina Dahl.

The Omni Quartet, comprised of Amy Lee and Alicia Koelz, violins, Joanna Zakany, viola, and Tanya Woolfrey, cello, are all members of The Cleveland Orchestra. Formed in 2009, they have toured the world’s greatest venues as members of the orchestra, including Carnegie Hall, the Edinburgh Festival, Vienna’s Musikverein, The Kennedy Center, and the Salzburg Festival. This versatile group plays concerts regularly in the greater Cleveland area, as well as branching off to do innovative concerts in alternative venues, from playing at Cleveland’s Happy Dog to playing in the Hall of Mirrors at the Primate’s Palace for the Ambassador of Bratislava.

Nancy Maultsby is in demand by opera companies and orchestras throughout the world. Her unique vocal timbre and insightful musicianship allow her to pursue a repertoire extending from the operas of Monteverdi and Handel to recent works by John Adams. She regularly performs the major heroines of nineteenth-century French, Italian, and German opera and the great symphonic masterpieces.