Vancouver Chamber Choir announces its first live performance in nearly a year
TOGETHER features a diverse program of enchanting choral works from near and far
Photo by Diamond’s Edge Photography.
The Vancouver Chamber Choir is returning to the stage with TOGETHER, its first live performance in nearly 12 months.
TOGETHER takes place September 24 at 7:30 pm PDT at Pacific Spirit United Church.
The ambitious program features reflective and expansive Canadian choral works as well as splashes of colour from elsewhere, notably Finland.
The evening will include two world premieres by B.C. composers Gerda Blok-Wilson (I Had No Time to Hate) and Don Macdonald (Moon Ravens). There will also be a collection of traditional choral selections.
Among the evening’s highlights is Tan ti ki tò (2017) by Alberto Schiavo, an Italian composer, instrumentalist, and musicologist. While he was composer in residence of the full-time professional Estonian male choir RAM in 2013, Schiavo composed a lively, rhythmic piece with unexpected textures for the group called Frottola No. 1; Tan ti ki tò is an adaptation of that work for mixed voices. Suffice to say that the composer’s approach here is fresh and surprising.
Laura Hawley’s Absence, created for Pro Coro Canada in 2018, is written to a comforting and optimistic poem by Pablo Neruda (original title Ausencia). Hawley, a composer and conductor based in Edmonton, has set the poem in both the original Spanish and in English.
The concert features two pieces by Healey Willan: Rise up, my love, my fair one; and Lo, in the time appointed. The former, from 1929, is set to a text from the Song of Solomon; it is a homophonic motet that flows freely, with all voices singing the same text at the same time. Lo, while set to another section of the Song of Solomon, illustrates Willan’s polyphonic skills. The two first imitative sections lead up to a lively “Alleluia”.
Epitaph for Moonlight (1968) by R. Murray Schafer and Readymade Alice (2011) by Perttu Haapanen are among the many other selections on the dynamic program.
TOGETHER has been a long time coming, and Vancouver Chamber Choir’s 2021 fall-season opening concert will be one to remember, with exceptional choral works in the company of friends once again,
“The musical setting is meant to mirror a dinner with friends – something I dearly missed last winter,” says Vancouver Chamber Choir conductor Kari Turunen. “The mood is sometimes roaring, sometimes light, at times serious and reflective.”
The live performance of TOGETHER will follow all public-health measures, with in-person attendance subject to provincial guidelines on masking, audience capacity, and vaccination status. TOGHETER will be recorded to video for release on VANCC DIGITAL approximately one week following the concert.
Tickets are $35, or $120 for a Fall 2021 Season Pass.
For more information, see Vancouver Chamber Choir.
Post sponsored by Vancouver Chamber Choir.