Acclaimed mezzo Sasha Cooke gives recital Thursday at Bethesda-by-the-Sea

If you’re going to have friends over for dinner, Sasha Cooke says, you have to give them a meal with balance.

“You can’t give them all meat and potatoes, nonstop,” she said. “You’ve got to have something light, something fun.”

And this Cooke’s recipe is very much on the menu for Thursday night, when the American mezzo-soprano takes the stage at the Episcopal church Bethesda-by-the-Sea to give an art song recital for the Chamber Music Society of Palm Beach.

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Joined by pianist John Churchwell, with whom Cooke teaches in the summer program at the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California, she will present a widely varied lineup of songs by Handel, Debussy, Wagner and two Americans: Jennifer Higdon and Michael Tilson Thomas.

Cooke, who grew up in College Station, Texas, where her parents taught Russian literature at Texas A&M University, is a widely admired singer whose holds two Grammys: One in 2021 for Tilson Thomas’s "Meditations on Rilke," a song cycle Cooke premiered, and another in 2019 for a recording of Mason Bates’ opera "The (R)evolution of Steve Jobs." She also was nominated for a Grammy for her 2022 solo album, "how do I find you," a collection of songs she commissioned from 17 different composers reflecting on the COVID-19 pandemic.

Next month, she appears as Donna Elvira in Mozart’s "Don Giovanni" at Houston Grand Opera and in June, sings the role of Brangäne in Wagner’s "Tristan und Isolde" for France’s Opera Rouen.

One of the weightier selections on the recital will be the "Wesendonck Lieder" of Richard Wagner, a five-song cycle written in 1857 when the composer was working on his groundbreaking opera "Tristan und Isolde," and perhaps — it was thought — having an affair with Mathilde Wesendonck, wife of one of his patrons. She was revealed to be the author of the texts of the five songs only after her death in 1902; they are highly romantic and fervent according to the fashion of the day, and they bear some resemblance to the kind of poetry Wagner himself penned.

They are also among the loveliest things he ever wrote, and a performance of the cycle is always something of an event.

Bringing out the 'inner life' of Wagner song cycle

“I think what‘s hard about them is bringing out the drama, the inner life of them,” Cooke said Monday during a phone interview from her home in Houston, adding that the songs have a preoccupied, intimate character. “But they are balanced well. Everything falls in the right place and perfectly sets you up.”

And they are good preparation for "Tristan" this summer. “I’m super-excited to be doing Wagner roles. Wagner has been in my ear,” she said, which is one of the reasons she wanted to include the Wesendonck songs on her program.

Also on the program is the "Chansons de Bilitis" ("Songs of Bilitis"), a deliciously beautiful three-song cycle from 1897 by Claude Debussy, set to texts by the French poet Pierre Louÿs, who said he had translated them from the writings of an ancient Greek compatriot of the lesbian poet Sappho. He later was unmasked as the creator of Bilitis, but not before the poems made a strong impact on the French literary scene of the day.

The Debussy cycle is relatively brief, Cooke notes, at nine to 10 minutes, and while it has a lighter feel than the Wagner, it also contains songs that make sentiments that are “already intimate even more intimate. They’re so special, and Debussy does that unlike anyone else,” she said.

Cooke, a graduate of Rice University and the Juilliard School, also is a pianist, and the Debussy songs have distinctively elegant writing for the instrument. “I always am partial to beautiful piano parts,” she said.

The recital opens with an aria, “As with rosy steps the morn,” from "Theodora," a late (1750) oratorio by Handel.

“I always feel that the first sounds of a concert are really important: How do we welcome everyone into the room? With the Handel, the piano introduction, I could listen to just those 10 bars and be happy,” Cooke said.

The aria, a radiant song of praise to God, became associated with the late mezzo Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, who died tragically at age 52 of breast cancer in 2006. Cooke was hesitant to take it on because of its associations with Lieberson, but during the disruptions to the musical world during the COVID-19 pandemic, decided to add it to her repertory.

Amercian composers Jennifer Higdon, Michael Tilson Thomas included

After the Handel, Debussy and Wagner come two sets of songs by living American composers, Higdon and Tilson Thomas.

“I want to do pieces that speak to each other, where nothing overwhelms the program,” she said. “I love new music, and these Higdon and Tilson Thomas songs are super-lyrical. They have an Americana feel to them, they’re accessible, tuneful and fun, and very beautiful. They’re a balm at the end of the program.”

The Higdon cycle, "Summer Music," was written for Cooke, who gave the premiere in Tucson early in 2022 at the Desert Song Festival. She will sing three songs from the eight songs in the cycle, and adds that they have “a kind of [Aaron] Copland quality.”

The recital ends with two songs by Tilson Thomas, long familiar to South Floridians as the visionary founder of the New World Symphony in Miami Beach, which for more than 35 years has been an elite training academy for young orchestral musicians. He was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2021 but has undergone surgery and treatment and is continuing to make conducting appearances.

“People don’t know what a great composer he is. His songs are so special, and they’re unknown,” Cooke said.

Unpublished song for Leonard Berstein's birthday will be performed

She’ll perform “Grace,” written for the mezzo Frederica von Stade in the 1980s, and an unpublished song, “Not Everyone Thinks I’m Beautiful,” written for the celebration of Leonard Bernstein’s 70th birthday at Tanglewood in 1988. She describes the songs as cabaret-like, reminiscent of Stephen Sondheim.

As her life continues on its busy forward track — she's also the mother of two daughters — she's hoping to do more opera and is enjoying mentoring younger singers at the Music Academy of the West. But she also recounts the story of her recent three-hour lunch in London with the legendary English mezzo-soprano Janet Baker, now 90, who never sang some of the signature mezzo roles, such as Bizet's Carmen, during her long career, but had no regrets.

That told Cooke that Baker's career had been no less valuable for not checking all the boxes on the long mezzo wish list. And that thought makes Sasha Cooke happy and grateful.

"I feel very lucky," she said.

Sasha Cooke, accompanied by pianist John Churchwell, appears at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea. Tickets are $75. Visit cmspb.org or call 561-379-6773.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Mezzo-soprano Sasha Cooke prepares balanced program for CMSPB recital