Photos: Maundy Mitchell

Mortality Mansions: Sheet Music GRAMMY®-winning composer Herschel Garfein and former US Poet Laureate Donald Hall create a vivid and moving eleven-song cycle set in late life. One of the most highly praised vocal works of our time, Mortality Mansions brims with stylistic inflections ranging from musical theater to German lieder, Latin montunos to Sousa marches.

The cycle starts at age sixty with contented domesticity and sexual fulfillment, only to pass through harrowing confrontations with death before arriving at a transcendent recognition of love's redemptive power.

On the Delos recording, tenor Michael Slattery and pianist Dimitri Dover lead this spirited, tender and moving journey in song. A touching reversed perspective comes from the song Otherwise, on a poem by Hall's deceased wife, Jane Kenyon. The 89 year-old Hall reads his poems, lending personal and historical significance. The liner notes are by David Hajdu, three-time winner of the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for music writing.

Mortality Mansions: Songs of Love and Loss Over 60

"In this shimmering, expressive song cycle… the verses of the former U.S. poet laureate — at once stately and urgent, rueful and earthy — find a beautiful counterpart in the music of Herschel Garfein."
— Kosman, San Francisco Chronicle
"Powerful... glowing... radiant... Garfein keeps the vocal line simple and forthright, communicating the text naturally while allowing the piano part to provide harmonic freshness.
Tenor Michael Slattery is a felicitous choice to perform these songs; his smooth, flexible, appealingly direct voice is a perfect match for the immediacy of expression that is a hallmark of both composer and poet."
— Rosenblum, Opera News
"Mortality Mansions is one of the most deeply moving and impressive vocal works of the twenty-first century. This is a recording that belongs on the shelf of anybody who cares about great poetry, great music, and the miracle that occurs when they are combined this masterfully."
— Gregory Berg, The Journal of Singing [published by the National Association of Teachers of Singing]
"The interpretations by Slattery and Dover are excellent, sometimes possessing a burning intensity but always sensitive to the tender moments... [Hall's] spoken words are so many treasures..."
— Dalton, Albany Times Union
Bilboard Charting Release!

Mortality Mansions: Songs of Love and Loss Over 60

GRAMMY®-winning composer Herschel Garfein and former US Poet Laureate Donald Hall create a vivid and moving eleven-song cycle set in late life. Tenor Michael Slattery and pianist Dimitri Dover lead this spirited journey in song, which brims with stylistic inflections ranging from musical theater to German lieder to Sousa marches.

The cycle starts at age sixty with contented domesticity and sexual fulfillment, only to pass through harrowing confrontations with death before arriving at a transcendent recognition of love's redemptive power. A touching reversed perspective comes with the concluding song Otherwise, on a poem by Hall's deceased wife, Jane Kenyon.

The 89 year-old Hall reads his poems, lending personal and historical significance. The liner notes are by David Hajdu, three-time winner of the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for music writing.

Includes a 44-page, full-color booklet.
Pre-release production copies of CD available May 10, 2018
Download press release (PDF)