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Cleveland Chamber Choir: In Four Voices (Dec. 3)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

Renaissance polyphony can bloom in resonant spaces, but the Donna and James Reid Gallery at the Cleveland Museum of Art presents particular challenges: hard surfaces and a long reverb tend to blur consonants into watercolor. The Cleveland Chamber Choir’s four-voice ensemble met those conditions head-on during its “In Four Voices” program on December 3. What emerged was an evening of consistently beautiful vocal timbre shaped by a group navigating the sonic characteristics of the room.

The concert, to be followed in January and March by appearances of various-sized ensembles, is part of a new development for the Cleveland Chamber Choir, called the Camerata Series — more information here.

To improve their chances of hearing one another, the quartet — soprano Lauren Vanden Broeck, mezzo-soprano Kira McGirr, tenor Joel Kincannon, and bass Dominic Aragon — stood in a traditional “part book” formation, like a diamond, facing inward. This meant that their sound was directed toward each other, rather than outward to the listeners around them. [Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir shines with music to mark the hours and seasons (Oct. 25)

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by Kevin McLaughlin

Often called The Vespers, Sergei Rachmaninoff’s All-Night Vigil reaches for something beyond an evening service. Its fifteen movements, rooted in Russian Orthodox chant, rise and surround like incense — not to display magnificence, but to deepen the mystery. Rachmaninoff was so fond of the work that he requested the fifth movement, the Nunc dimittis, be sung at his funeral.

On Friday evening, October 25, the Cleveland Chamber Choir, directed by Gregory Ristow, presented this monumental work in Trinity Cathedral — a resonant space of tradition and calm, where the beauty of the setting matched the beauty of the sound.

[Read more…]

Cleveland Consort of Voices at Church of the Saviour (Feb. 12)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Cleveland has become something of a hotbed for chamber music, with a winter season sponsored by the Cleveland Chamber Music Society, two summer series curated by ChamberFest Cleveland and Encore Chamber Music Institute, and an orchestra famous for playing with the precision and nuance of a 90-piece string quartet.

What has been missing is vocal chamber music — the one-singer-on-a-part format that reaches such a high level in such European ensembles as Voces8 and the King’s Singers. But now enter the Cleveland Consort of Voices, a new group organized and led by Oberlin musicology professor and Collegium conductor Steven Plank. [Read more…]

“The joy of singing” with 
The Cleveland Consort of Voices

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by Mike Telin 

Forming a small vocal ensemble was something that Steven Plank had wanted to do for a long time. And when a surge in COVID cases forced him to reduce the number of singers in the choir at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, the opportunity arose. “We began doing the liturgy with just eight singers,” Plank said during a telephone conversation. “We were having such a good time that one Thursday evening I asked if they would like to do some concerts. And they all said yes.”

On Sunday, February 12 at 4:00 pm at Church of the Saviour in Cleveland Heights,  Plank will lead The Cleveland Consort of Voices — Sandra Simon and Emily Stauch (sopranos), Elizabeth Frey and Madelyn Hasebein (altos), Brian Skoog and Joel Kincannon (tenors), and Luca Cantone and Brian Wacker (basses) — in a program that celebrates the joy of singing. The concert is free. Click here for details.

Plank said that in addition to being personally fond of all the music on the program, choosing the works allowed him to do a little experimenting.

[Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir: “A Season of Thanksgiving”

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by Jarrett Hoffman

This year and last, Thanksgiving has taken on an additional meaning, something that the Cleveland Chamber Choir will recognize in a free program to open its seventh season on Saturday, November 6 at 7:00 pm at St. Ambrose Parish in Brunswick.

Celebrating life and gratitude as a way of recognizing all that musicians and audiences have gone through over the last eighteen months, “A Season of Thanksgiving” brings together sacred music by Kerry Andrew, Gwyneth Walker, Kevin Allen, Josef Gabriel Rheinberger, Susan LaBarr, and Jose Elberdin, as well as arrangements by Sarah Quartel, Mark Butler, and Kevin S. Foster. (Click here to learn about CCC’s safety practices related to COVID-19.)

The Choir will be represented by an octet made up of sopranos Jackie Josten and Anna E. White, altos Katie Fowler and Kira McGirr, tenors Joel Kincannon and Peter Wright, and basses Jelani Watkins and Corey Fowler — CCC’s assistant conductor, who will also be directing the ensemble.

On that note, when I reached Fowler last Friday during a break in his teaching at Roosevelt High School, where he is Director of Choirs, we began our conversation on the topic of leading a group while also singing within it.

[Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir: “Madrigals of All Times” (May 15 video)

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by Jarrett Hoffman

Musicians are not necessarily known for their acrobatic abilities, but jumping through one or two hoops has become an important part of their job description.

That’s exactly what Scott MacPherson and the Cleveland Chamber Choir did for the second performance of their sixth season. Masked and spaced several feet apart, the ensemble gathered for a recording session in the resonant space of a Train Avenue warehouse on Cleveland’s West Side last month. The resulting video — “Madrigals of All Times,” released on May 15 — is excellent in programming, performance, and production.

Two central threads run through MacPherson’s mosaic of madrigals: world premieres, and pairings of Renaissance and 20th-century pieces, which in several cases are set to the same text. [Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir at St. John’s Cathedral (Nov. 8)

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by Daniel Hathaway

Conductor Scott MacPherson had two things in mind when choosing repertoire for Cleveland Chamber Choir’s first pair of concerts this season. The program had to reflect this season’s concentration on music by women composers, and the works needed to flourish in the lively acoustic of venues in Cleveland and Akron. The first performance, on Friday, November 8 at the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist, scored high on both counts. [Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir to present “Lux Caelestis” concerts this weekend

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by Daniel Hathaway

To begin its fifth season, the professional singers of Scott MacPherson’s Cleveland Chamber Choir will present identical programs at St. John’s Cathedral in downtown Cleveland on Friday, November 8 at 7:30 pm, and at St. Sebastian Church in Akron on Sunday, November 10 at 5:00 pm.

“Our overall theme this season is ‘Women’s Voices Resounding,’” MacPherson said in a telephone conversation. “A good chunk of the repertoire is by women composers and poets. And the first pair of concerts will be given in memory of my dear friend Helen Tremaine Gregory, who passed away last winter. She was a businesswoman and philanthropist who sang in my town-gown Kent Chorale.”

When MacPherson puts a concert program together, he often begins with a central piece out of which companion works spring. “The centerpiece of these programs is Timothy Kramer’s Lux Caelestis, a piece he wrote for me when I was at Trinity University in San Antonio,” the conductor said. “I asked him for a piece we could sing on tour in Cologne Cathedral — one that was appropriate for a watery acoustic.” [Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir: “The Personal Muse” (May 18)

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by David Kulma

The Cleveland Chamber Choir has a bold tagline: “More than Music!” The final program of their fourth season, a collaboration with the Cleveland Composers Guild, clearly reflected this progressive mandate. Pairing living, local composers with works by British and American women, artistic director Scott MacPherson curated a delightful, satisfying evening titled “The Personal Muse” at Fairmount Presbyterian Church on Saturday, May 18. [Read more…]

Cleveland Chamber Choir at John Knox Presbyterian (Oct. 28)

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by Daniel Hathaway

cleveland-chamber-choir-marie-taylorAfter singing its “Americana” program at First Baptist Church in Shaker Heights on October 22, the 30-voice Cleveland Chamber Choir moved to John Knox Presbyterian Church in North Olmsted for a second performance on Friday, October 28. Conductor Scott MacPherson curated his program of American choral music with the election season in mind. Not as a rah-rah patriotic exercise, but rather to explore the rich heritage of vocal traditions that have been practiced within these shores over the past two-and-a-half centuries. [Read more…]

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