James Chi-shin Liu Baritone	Performer's Resume [About my Day Job]  [Upcoming Performances]  [Home] [PDF of resume]  [Recordings]  [Pictures]
Biography: Baritone James Liu is a physician with varied musical interests. He has announced and produced classical music programming at WHRB. He has sung in many choruses, including the Cantata Singers. His art song repertoire includes Die schöne Müllerin, Winterreise, Dichterliebe, Histoires naturelles and Don Quichotte à Dulcinée. He has appeared with Opera51, Lowell House Opera, Indian Hill Music, Harvard Early Music Society, Opera del West, Longwood Opera, North End Music and Performing Arts Center, Encore Opera Company, Boston Opera Collaborative, and Opera Boston. Roles include The Magic Flute (Second Man in Armour, Papageno), The Marriage of Figaro (Antonio, Bartolo, Almaviva, Figaro), Così fan tutte (Guglielmo, Alfonso), Fledermaus (Dr. Falke), Gounod's Faust (Valentin) and Roméo et Juliette (Capulet), Verdi's Otello (Montano) and Falstaff (Pistola), Ariadne auf Naxos (Music Teacher), Hansel and Gretel (The Father), Fidelio (Don Fernando), Turandot (Ping), and Tosca (Scarpia). He is indebted to his voice teacher, Frank Kelley, and to his infinitely patient wife who makes all of this possible. You can download a PDF of my performance resume from my Boston Singers' Resource page. You can see and hear various performances in a playlist posted on LinkTree.

Choral Groups:

Spoken Word:

• First Church in Boston, MA.
  July 2015: Organized the Order of Service and delivered a sermon inspired by the Holy Sonnets of John Donne by Benjamin Britten
  August 2012: Organized the Order of Service and delivered a sermon titled "Doubt: Its Use and Abuse."
• DMC Productions, LLC, Boston, MA, 2010.
  Voice-over work for a documentary titled Bruno Droste: An Artist's Flight to Freedom.
   
• WHRB-FM, Cambridge MA, 1986 - 1990, 2000 - present.
  Producer, announcer and studio controlman for classical music broadcasts, weekly special features and extended Orgy presentations. Significant productions as programmer and announcer include:
  Wilhelm Furtwängler Orgy (22 hour broadcast), May 2004
  Erich Kleiber Orgy (12 hour broadcast), May 2003
  Serge Koussevitzky Orgy (16 hour broadcast), May-June 2001
  Bruno Walter Orgy (36 hour broadcast), May 1989
  Ludwig van Beethoven Orgy (co-producer of comprehensive 105 hour survey), January 1989
  Janos Starker Orgy (12 hour broadcast), May 1988
  Sviatoslav Richter Orgy (18 hour broadcast), January 1988
  Historic Performances (weekly feature, Sunday evenings), September 1987 - April 1989
• Hunan Medical University, Changsha, Hunan, China, 1998 - 1999
  Recorded spoken text for audio tapes to accompany English textbooks for mainland Chinese market.

Essays about Classical Music and Texts and Translations:

• Archive of classical music concert reviews at The Boston Musical Intelligencer.
   
• Essays, biographies, texts, translations, and links available on my Classical Music web page. Excerpts from my notes and translations have been used by the following organizations:
  Back Bay Chorale, Boston MA (multiple concerts including J.S. Bach Cantata 196, Beethoven Missa Solemnis, Bruckner Motets, Fauré Requiem, Honegger Le Roi David, Monteverdi Adoramus te and Cantate Domino and Mass in four parts (1651), Mozart Mass in c and Ave verum corpus)
  Combined concert by the Memorial Congregational Church and Fisk Memorial United Methodist Church choirs, Sudbury MA, May 2003 (notes and translations for the Mozart Ave verum corpus)
  Stonewall Chorale, New York City, February 2006 (notes and translations for the Mozart Ave verum corpus)
  University Choir, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor MI, December 2006 (Narrator translations used for an English language performance of Honegger Le Roi David)
  Macquarie University Singers, Sydney Australia, May 2008 (notes and translations for the Fauré Requiem)
  Boston University Tanglewood Institute, Lenox MA, August 2008 (translations for Honegger Le Roi David)
  Lifetime Learning Center, Seattle WA, Fall 2009 (Texts and translations used for a class about Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle)
  United States Military Academy, West Point NY, December 2009 (Texts and translations for Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle used for a recital as part of a German Media class)
  La Jolla Music Society, La Jolla, CA, August 2010 (Texts and translations for Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle used for a recital in the SummerFest 2010 recital series)
  Doudna Fine Arts Center at Eastern Illinois University, March 2011 (Program notes for Schubert's Die schöne Müllerin cycle used for a recital by Matthew Polenzani and Julius Drake)
  Emmanuel Music, Boston MA, February 2012 (Texts and translations for Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle used for a recital by Frank Kelley and Russell Sherman)
  Carnegie Hall Neighborhood Concert Series, New York NY, October 2012 (Texts and translations for Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle used for a recital by Jeffrey Goble)
  Concerts at the Library of Congress, Washington DC

  April 2013: Text and translation for Im Rhein, im heiligen Strome used for a performance by Gabriel Kahane and Timothy Andres

  October 2015: Texts and translations for Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle used for a recital by Nicholas Phan and Myra Huang)
  Bellows Free Academy, St. Albans VT, May 2013 (notes for the Fauré Requiem)
  Wagner 200 Festival, London, June 2013 (Text and translation for Im Rhein, im heiligen Strome used for a recital by Janice Watson)
  Gallery Players of Niagara, Ontario, November 2014 (Texts and translations for Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle used for a recording of the cycle transcribed for baritone and chamber ensemble)
  Chamber Choir and Ensemble of Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance, March 2015 (Program notes for Carissimi's Oratorio, Jephte)
  New Marlborough Village Association Music and More series, August 2015 (Text and translation for Schubert's Die schöne Müllerin cycle used for a recital by Frank Kelley and Joshua Rifkin)
  Banff Centre Musical Encounter Series, March 2016 (Texts and translations for Schumann's Dichterliebe cycle used for a recital by Philippe Sly and Michael McMahon)

Last updated: March 25, 2024

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