Senior Recital: Vivian Davenport, Soprano
Vivian Davenport ’25 performing at her senior recital. (Alice Van Etten/The Gettysburgian)
This article originally appeared on pages 12 and 13 of the No. 5 April 2025 edition of The Gettysburgian magazine
By Ainsley Green, Staff Writer
On Saturday, March 1, Vivian Davenport ’25 performed her senior recital in Paul Recital Hall. Davenport is a music performance major with a focus in voice, and she studies with professor Jeffrey L. Fahnestock. A large audience of friends, faculty, family and other members of the Gettysburg community came out to support the accomplishments of Davenport, whose senior recital was the first of many this semester.
The recital was entitled “Es war einmal,” translating to “Once upon a time” in German, which reflects Davenport’s vision of a fairy-tale inspired program of pieces.
“This title reflects my time abroad in Vienna, Austria where I attended the Viennese Ball and often roamed palace gardens,” said Davenport. “I learned a ton throughout this experience due to my choice of complex pieces,” she added, detailing the process of figuring out the recital program of her dreams.
Across the program, she sang in English, Russian, French, German, Italian and Norwegian, representing a wide range of composers writing music through different periods of time and all over the world.
The first set of pieces included “Love in the Dictionary” by Celius Dougherty, the fifth of “12 romances, Op. 25” by Sergei Rachmaninoff and “Always It’s Spring” by Lee Hoiby. Davenport was accompanied by professor Scott Crowne on piano. For her next set, she performed “I. En Sourdine” and “II. Fantoches” from Claude Debussy’s “Fêtes galantes” and “La sirene” by Georges Bizet. Each piece’s accompaniment complimented the melodies Davenport sang.
For the next piece, “IX. Les lilas qui avaient fleuri” of “Clairières dans la ciel” by Lili Boulanger, Davenport was accompanied by fellow student Greer Garver ’25 on piano. During the next set of pieces, Davenport sang four songs representing different flowers as women entitled “Mädchenblumen, Op. 22” by Richard Strauss.
Continuing to branch out to new languages in her pieces, Davenport sang “A Vuccella” and “Visione!” by Francesco Tosti followed by Edvard Grieg’s “Med en Vandlilje” and “En svane,” which encompassed various themes of love, loss and peaceful allusions to nature. Next, Davenport sang a longer set of works by Clara Wieck Schumann in varying keys and tempi, which coherently created momentum as each piece built off of the last. These pieces, from Schumann’s “6 lieder, Op.13,” included “I. Ich stand in dunklen träumen,” “II. Sie liebten sich beide,” “III. Liebeszauber,” “IV. Der mond kommt still gegangen” and “VI. Die stille lotosblume.”
(Alice Van Etten/The Gettysburgian)
In the final set, Davenport closed with “Mein Liebeslied muß ein Walzer sein” from Robert Stolz’s “The White Horse Inn,” the familiar and touching song “Home,” from Alan Menken’s “Beauty and the Beast” and another romance by Rachmaninoff, creating a dramatic “happy ending” for the recital by depicting blooms of spring. Davenport received a standing ovation from the crowd as she took a bow at the end of this amazing musical milestone in her undergraduate studies.
Davenport reflected on her time at the Sunderman Conservatory: “After my four years at Gettysburg, I can say that I have gained confidence as a performer but also as a person.”
Remembering her favorite parts about the Conservatory, she added, “I love the close-knit community. Everyone is really supportive and wants you to succeed along your musical journey!”
Davenport plans to take a gap year to discover more about her voice and piano skills before applying to graduate school for vocal performance and continuing her higher education.
