Crescendo Spring 2012 Choir Season

REPERTOIRE STUDY MONTHS

These sessions will be led by Crescendo's director Christine Gevert. The goal is to learn and train much liked repertoire that Crescendo Chorus has performed in the past. A minimum of three singers per section will guarantee that the ensemble is balanced. Optional reading sessions and study tapes are there to help singers to learn this repertoire faster if it is new to them. Singers that already know the repertoire will gain a deeper understanding and experience of this repertoire. Crescendo hopes to present these pieces again in concert in the future – especially in the 2013/14 season, which will be our 10^th anniversary year.

 REPERTOIRE

·                       1. JANUARY: “To Hope!” - Jazz Mass by Dave Brubeck

Jazz legend Dave Brubeck is equally distinguished as composer and pianist. “To Hope!”  is an exciting work of grand proportion. It is a monumental affirmation of hope and exultation. Composed in 1979, “To Hope!” is a dynamic work. It is multifaceted. It contains elements of fugal writing reminiscent of the Baroque period, the large scale chordal sections of Classical composers, the colors of the Romanticists, the rhythms and chord structures of the Modernists and the uninhibited joy of Gospel. It remembers the Latin and the Greek; it is Middle Eastern and Middle European; it is Native American and Hispanic; it is past and present. It evokes musical textures and images that ride on the meanings and rhythms of the text. It contains profoundly moving passages, dance-like rhythms, deep emotion, and optimism. Dave Brubeck wrote in a letter about Crescendo's 2006 performance to director Christine Gevert: “Your experience with the piece ["To Hope" Jazz Mass] was exactly what I wanted to happen.  Thank you so much for demonstrating how the composition realized those goals in your guiding hands!”  --  Listen to a performance of the Gloria from this Mass by Crescendo in 2006.  Click HERE.

·                      2. FEBRUARY: “Requiem in A major” by Heinrich I. F. Biber

Heinrich I. F. Biber (1644 –1704) was a Bohemian-Austrian composer and violinist, director of music at the Salzburg Cathedral. During Biber's lifetime, his music was known and imitated throughout Europe. In the late 18th century he was named the best violin composer of the 17th century by his contemporaries. A prolific composer of sacred vocal works: masses, requiems, motets, etc. Many of those were poly-choral and employing large instrumental forces, inspired by the possibilities of the spacious interior of the Salzburg Cathedral. The “Requiem in A major” was composed after the death of Biber’s friend and patron, Archbishop Maximilian Gandolph, and was rediscovered only in the 1990s by the Dutch early music specialist Ton Koopman. Crescendo performed the East Coast premiere of this work in 2008 with six soloists and an orchestra of 17 period instrument musicians. The  Lakeville Journal about this performance: “...Even today, a profoundly theatrical performance like this can awaken notions of penitence, transcendence and eternity in any of us. And Christine Gevert assembled a mighty collection of musicians and singers [in] an original and moving performance...”

·                     3. MARCH: “Misa Criolla” by Ariel Ramirez

The composer Ariel Ramírez was born in Santa Fé, Argentina, in 1921 and is known as one of the most popular musicians both in his home country and abroad. In 1964 he composed and recorded his famous Misa Criolla which was highly acclaimed. Scored for Tenor(s), mixed choir, percussion, 'Andean' instruments and optional harpsichord, all movements of this mass are based on Argentinian and Bolivian folk rhythms. The writing of such a Mass became possible only after the reforms of Vatican II (1960) which allowed secular languages and instruments other than the organ for the Holy Mass, and created a need for each country to provide own musical settings.  Ramirez portrays the two cultures, the indigenous, represented by the tenor soloists, the folk instruments and rhythms, and the Hispanic by most of the choral settings in traditional four part harmony. The hispanic magazine of Bard College “La Voz” wrote about Crescendo's 2006 performance: “...from the first note on the audience was hypnotized by the sound of “Misa Criolla”...” and Simon Wainrib for the Berkshire Record “...an enthusiastic audience rewarded them with thunderous applause.”

REHEARSALS

Regular: Four Mondays 7-8:30pm
Extra weekly reading rehearsals possible (optional, by appointment)
1. Start Jan. 9     2. Start Feb. 6      3. Start Mar. 5
Rehearsal Location: Trinity Church, 484 Lime Rock Rd., Lakeville, CT

PERFORMANCES

None at this point. (There are possibilities of performing excerpts of the studied works at the end of the month, or beginning of the next, at an Evensong or other venue.)

REGISTRATION FEE /DEADLINE

$30/month  or $75 all three months (plus purchase/copy of your own scores)

Registration Deadline: January 15, 2012

Recurring singers can register and pay the fee online:   www.worldclassmusic.org/crescendo/Participate/Chorus_fee.htm
or by check (Registration  Feb2012 OR Mar2012) to Crescendo, PO Box 245 Lakeville CT 06039

SCORES

“To Hope” $12.95 +shipping (sheetmusicplus.com), Biber Requiem $7.60 (C. Gevert edition), Misa Criolla $5.95 +shipping (sheetmusicplus.com)

AUDITIONS

For new singers: artdir@worldclassmusic.org  / 860-318-1812

QUESTIONS

info@worldclassmusic.org