About
Rita Costanzi
Through her depth of expression as an internationally recognized harp soloist, actor, writer and teacher, Rita Costanzi, in the words of Celtic Author, Treasa O’Driscoll, “bears the mark of the true artist whose task it is to rise above the tumult of the times. A force of truth and love in herself and a musician of exceptional accomplishment, her playing never fails to touch the souls of listeners in deep and unexpected ways.”
Winner of The 2020 Hershey Felder Presents Arts Prize Competition, Costanzi’s short documentary film “Moonlight in the Bronx”, captivated viewers around the world with its moving, powerful and timely memorial to Ludwig van Beethoven and the victims of the Corona Virus. Heralded as “A Hymn to New York” – it conveys, with profundity and grace, a vital message for our times in its portrayal of Beethoven’s isolation through deafness, the world’s through Covid-19 and her own, through divorce. Costanzi wrote, directed and performed her original script, reflecting yet again her “warmth, conviction and exquisite virtuosity.”
The 2021 Sunflower Festival in Topeka, Kansas, hosted the stunning World Premiere of Costanzi’s Theater Piece – Woman On A Ledge – by Hershey Felder, with the support of a grant from The National Endowment for the Arts. Bringing her life story to the stage in this groundbreaking, powerful hybrid of solo harp music and theatrical performance, Woman On A Ledge expresses the female musician’s fraught and complex life experience with its conflicts, devotion, love and loss. It will be mounted Off-Off Broadway November 7 to 24, 2024 in a new, reimagined staging by Director, Lissa Moira.
An artist of immense gifts
Vancouver Sun
Since relocating to New York City in 2007, Costanzi has collaborated with Director, Arthur Masella, long-time Associate of Hal Prince, on an award winning one-woman show which was featured at The United Solo Theater Festival in New York City, The Ottawa International Festival and at The World Harp Congress in Sydney. An acclaimed international soloist and teacher, Costanzi has performed and given Master Classes in North and South America, Europe and Canada. Her latest CD with renowned oboist, Alex Klein, entitled “Amoroso,” on the Navona Records label – released in 2023, has received over one million streams.
Ms. Costanzi’s training began at an early age under the guidance of her father, the noted violist Francis Tursi, and harpist Eileen Malone. After graduating from the Eastman School of Music with Highest Distinction and the Performer’s Certificate, she furthered her studies with Bernard Zighera, Marcel Grandjany, and in France on an ITT International Fellowship with Jacqueline Borot. She was twice winner of the American Harp Society’s National Competition and recipient of the Lily Laskine Award for the most outstanding solo harp recital.
Awards & Honors
Winner of the 2020 Hershey Felder Presents Arts Prize Competition
2-time winner of the American Harp Society’s National Competition
Lily Laskine Award winner for most outstanding solo harp recital
Winner of the United Solo “Best Concert” Award, 2011
The Strings of my Heart
To be released in early 2025by Page PublishingThe Saint Bartholomew Angel
As I approach the small side Chapel, she begins to appear in the cold, damp semi-darkness of St.
Bartholomew’s Church….
My pain leads me to her – my longing – my aching heart….
There she kneels in infinite Patience and Stillness: stone-feathered wings at rest, pupiless stone eyes looking nowhere, a long, strong stone nose leading to stone lips – neither smiling nor sad – only meeting one another, gently touching without one word….
Without any desire to speak….
Her arms of stone hold the Baptismal Font: continuous holding: days, months, years of bearing such a Destiny without one complaint.
There is no cry from her heavy, invisible stone Heart.
Only…silent Renunciation….
She holds the Font in eternal acceptance and teaches me to hold my harp the same…
Acceptance of the Unacceptable.
“This is what it means,” she silently shows me.
“This is what it means to meet one’s Destiny with strength – fully offering all one has In Service. This is how to humbly give of oneself – just give and continue to give, bearing the painful weight in one’s arms as one holds the Font –
The Harp –
The Cross
In patient, quiet Being, Deepening, Growing, Ripening…
This is Grace.
This is Love.
This is why we are here:
Fathomless, enduring Love….
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