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college choir festival

Saturday, November 13, 2004 at 10:30 am

Meet our new college classmates at a festive all-day event. Building on the success of our high school festival, Music Director Grant Gershon and the Master Chorale introduce an equally inspiring and stimulating program for college-age choristers.

Selecting from Southern California’s many fine college choirs, we’ve invited four standout groups to form a great choral ensemble of 180 singers. Their new “campus” is the spectacular Walt Disney Concert Hall where participants will hear themselves as never before in Gehry’s amazing surround-sound.

Our festival’s freshman schedule is an ambitious one. First, we’ll showcase one superb college choir after another in individual mini-concerts. After a lunch break, it’s time to regroup for the festival’s finale — a concert of a cappella works by the Master Chorale plus Henryk Mikolaj Górecki’s Miserere performed by the full contingent of college choirs and the Chorale. Sung a cappella and with just five words of text, the Polish composer’s moving masterpiece reflects his struggle against oppression and resonates with spirituality and humanity.

Reviewing the Master Chorale’s 2000 performance of Górecki’s Miserere, the Los Angeles Times hailed “…an intensity, concentration and devotion that was its own political and spiritual statement… the ethereal resolution, as Górecki finally unlocks the final two words of the text, ’Miserere nobis’ (Lord have mercy on us), is a vocal halo that envelops the hall, a final three heavenly minutes of ecstatic supplication.”

Bringing energy and enthusiasm to one of the most important and demanding choral works of the past 50 years, our College Choir Festival debuts with an inspiring message of peace.

Concert sponsors: This concert is sponsored in part by City of Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department, Los Angeles County Arts Commission and The Fletcher Jones Foundation

Participating schools

click on the school name for mini-concert repertoire

California State University, Long Beach, University Choir and Symphonic Band. Dr. Jonathan Talberg, Director of Choral, Vocal and Opera Studies

California State University Los Angeles, Chamber Singers. Dr. William Belan, Director of Choral Studies

Loyola Marymount University, Consort Singers. Dr. Mary C. Breden, Chair, Dept. of Music/ Director of Choral Activities

Occidental College, Occidental Glee Club. Dr. Jeffrey Bernstein, Director of Choral Music

Download a guide to the season: chorale-seasonguide0405.pdf, 808KB