Hurd’s program incorporated music in multiple languages.
In both duet performances and individual compositions, Amina Hurd ’23 performed on Friday evening, which marked her final Senior Recitalist concert of her career. Her performance featured a duet with fellow soloist Iris Guo ’23, presenting works by Giuseppe Giordani, Sergei Rachmaninoff, Franz Schubet, Claudio Monteverdi, and Robert Schumann.
As a member of the Academy Chorus, Keynotes, and Fidelio, Hurd discussed how her solo performance strayed from her past experiences and how she had to prepare differently for this solo. Moreover, she did not decide that she would even perform in a Senior Recital until this term.
“I actually didn’t start voice lessons until this term, just because I didn’t previously think that the recital was something I would do for sure… [But] when the application came out last year for the Seniors, I was like ‘Ok, so this is absolutely something that I’m interested in, absolutely something that I want to do.’ So I started the rehearsal process when we came back, which left us a very short period of time to learn a lot of songs,” said Hurd.
Hurd and Guo’s performances featured individual pieces as well as combined duets by a variety of artists. Her performance also featured a variety of works by different artists — many in foreign languages — and she shared how those pieces informed her decision making and preparation process.
“Iris and I did a mix of duets and solo pieces… So [for] Iris and I, our first duet was in German, by Robert Schumann, and my three pieces, we each did a set of three pieces… Those were the pieces that we chose, for me personally, most of the pieces are pieces that I’ve done before, and I’ve really liked,” said Hurd.
Hurd reflected on the highlights of her concert, and how opening with the duet set the tone for the rest of the performance, as well as the feelings she had as she worked through her pieces.
“I really enjoyed opening it with the duet with Iris, especially because that duet…was so near and dear to my heart personally, so it was really fun to sing it again in a performance space with a really good friend of mine. I also really enjoyed Iris’s ‘Ave Maria.’ I hadn’t previously listened to it, because I didn’t make it to the… chamber music concert [it had been performed at]… so I had never heard it,” said Hurd.
As Hurd reflected on her music career at Andover, she is appreciative of the opportunity to perform a cappella. She had seen the medium in movies, and in pop culture but did not believe she would get the opportunity until college.
“I think discovering a cappella was huge for me, because I’m always with accompaniment. At my old school, at choir, we always had piano or piano and percussion or woodwind of some sort, so we were always with accompaniment. Just thinking about being the accompaniment ourselves, with our voices and creating different rhythms and also the addition of beatboxing, shout out to Seb, that’s really cool and really cool to think about,” said Hurd.
