The mezzo-soprano, Andrea Iftimie, the hope of the Romanian lyrical stage, and the much appreciated and skilled pianist, Verona Maier, have opened the fifth edition of the Tuesday Evening Season. The Small Concert Hall of the Romanian Athenaeum hosted the lied recital performed with feeling and delicacy by the two musicians on 15^th October. Andrea Iftimescu, a mezzo-soprano with veritable performing vocal assets has made herself known to the public through her performances at the 'Ludovic Spiess' Experimental Opera and Ballet Studio, the 'CHEI' Bucharest Festival and the 'Opera Viva' Festival in Cluj Napoca. She is a PhD. Student at the Bucharest National Music University after having graduated from our great soprano Maria Slatinaru Nistor's canto lessons and the MA course with PhD Eleonora Enachescu.

"It is an important evening for Andrea Iftimescu as she will discover a certain vocality by making the transition from Frauenliebe und Leben by Schumann to Kindertotenlieder by Mahler. There is a strong preference for Mahler if you take into consideration that she is making research for her post-graduate thesis on vocal creation, on Mahler, in particular. I think that together with Verona Maier they will manage to create an extremely tensed and profound atmosphere which will carry you to spiritual peaks that are quite hard to imagine. Her voice is her asset, the extremely vocal colour being most likely directed towards the tragedy reflected by Mahler's series." (PhD Eleonora Enachescu)

The mezzo-soprano Andrea Iftimescu and the pianist Verona Maier offered to the public attending the Small Concert Hall of the Romanian Athenaeum, the lied series A Woman's Love and Life by Robert Schumann and Songs on the Death of Children by Gustav Mahler. A recital in which tragedy, feeling and empathy flowed continuously even after the end of the performance, due to the comments of the two artists:

"I have sung Frauenliebe und Leben for the first time and I can only be grateful for adding this series to my repertoire as it is an absolutely wonderful lied series. And Kindertotenlieder - the title says it all - Songs on the Death of Children is an extremely difficult lied series. It is hard not to allow yourself to be overwhelmed by emotions when you perform them and I hope I have managed to convey this atmosphere to the public attending this evening." (Andrea Iftimescu)

"I hope it was impressive because if we are talking about something in particular in tonight's programme, it is about a rainbow of emotions. Starting with the first lied series, and I am referring to A Woman's Love and Life with its unusually dark and dramatic emotions and continuing with the second lied series, I can only say that this is the kind of performance that brings forth the essence of music itself, in general, besides the intimate pitch and the emotional depth that can be brought forth by music." (Verona Maier)

The mezzo-soprano Andrea Iftimescu and the pianist Verona Maier had a public that warmly rewarded the emotional performance rendered through the two lied series signed by Robert Schumann and Gustav Mahler.