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VAN FEATURES
St. George’s Choral Society hosts annual Summer Choral Festival
Posted 5/21/2019

Matthew LewisWith many choirs on hiatus during the summer months, some singers are left searching for opportunities to flex their vocal cords until their regular rehearsal schedules resume in the fall. St. George’s Choral Society, a stalwart of the New York City choral community, offers a solution. Beginning Tuesday, June 4, the group will host its annual Summer Choral Festival, a two-week choral intensive that culminates in a performance of Durante’s Magnificat and Handel’s Laudate pueri, HWV 237 on Saturday, June 15. St. George’s Choral Society president and soprano Rachel Ruoff sat down with the choir's artistic director, Matthew Lewis, to discuss this exciting opportunity that’s open to all singers looking for a creative way to spend their summer evenings.

Rachel Ruoff: What influenced your decision to perform Handel's Laudate pueri and Durante's Magnificat for the Summer Choral Festival?

Matthew Lewis: I try to find pieces that are fun to sing, challenging and yet manageable for the rehearsal parameters we have. Some of the big choral pieces would be fun, but we would have trouble learning them in four rehearsals. Having said that, we've definitely done some difficult works in past festivals! Like the year we did the Poulenc Gloria along with the Bernstein Chichester Psalms. These pieces are, to some degree, standard choral repertoire, but it was tough getting them learned and finessed in four rehearsals. The Durante and Handel we are doing this year are delightful and fun pieces, both in a similar style. The orchestration is strings only for the Durante, and strings plus oboes for the Handel. More...


Anderson to lead chant and polyphony workshop in June
Posted 5/15/2019

Chant workshop--AndersonThis June, early music guru Michael Alan Anderson convenes his fourth annual institute “Singing Gregorian Chant and Renaissance Polyphony” through the Eastman School of Music. This is the first year the workshop will take place in New York City. Michael spoke with Andrea Schuler, Summer@Eastman Program Coordinator.

Andrea Schuler: How did you come to early music, specifically Gregorian chant and Renaissance polyphony?

Michael Alan Anderson: As an undergraduate at Notre Dame, I was exposed to some Renaissance polyphony in men’s glee club. And, as a music student, I was—like many—transported by the sound when I first heard the Hilliard Ensemble’s iconic Perotin recording. I had to have more! After graduating, I reconnected with a teacher of mine from Notre Dame, Calvin Bower, who lived in Chicago. He proposed starting an ensemble as a kind of laboratory for his work on liturgical sequences. We founded Schola Antiqua of Chicago in 2000. The experience of singing for Calvin was one of discovery and inquiry. Soon I was in graduate school studying this stuff, and I haven’t looked back or been lured to other periods of music history. There is too much richness sitting in medieval and Renaissance sources! More...


Archive of old VAN Features

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NEWS
VAN welcomes news of interest to the vocal ensemble community. Send stories to the editor.
  • Read the New York Times obituary of Joseph Flummerfelt, who died last week at the age of 82. (2019-3-6)
  • The GMChorale, a 90-voice choir based in Middletown, CT, has announced the appointment of Melissa Rooklidge as Assistant Conductor and Director of Operations, the first person to fill these newly-created roles. For more details, visit www.gmchorale.org. (2019-2-28)
  • Ember has moved its Tuesday-evening rehearsal location to the Opera America building, 330 7th Avenue (2-1/2 blocks south of Penn Station) effective as of March 5. As Ember draws its membership from New York and New Jersey, the new location, near Penn Station, was selected for its accessibility to singers from both states. For more details, see Ember's audition ad on the Choir Auditions page. (2019-2-26)
  • Interkultur's American International Choral Festival runs February 14-18, 2019 in Princeton, NJ. For details, visit www.interkultur.com/events/2019/princeton/. (2018-12-30)
  • Florilegium Chamber Choir has appointed James Knox Sutterfield as its music director, the fourth in its forty-three year history. (2018-12-20)

Archive of old "News" items

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NEW ON VAN
The latest additions to the site's content and features.
  • May 20, 2019: New VAN QuickLink for Sounds Choral, broadcast on WWFM.
  • April 30, 2019: New Choir Directory listing and Choir Auditions ad for Here to Sing, a non-audition pop/rock community choir in Manhattan.
  • April 25, 2019: New link for Singing A Cappella at Home, a HomeAdvisor (!) tutorial with an interesting collection of a cappella resources.
  • March 27, 2019: New link for The London Singing Institute, offering singing lessons for those in or near the UK capital.
  • February 5, 2019: For those using non-Microsoft browsers, we've changed the layout of the Info Exchange so as to show only the ad titles upon first viewing the page. You then have the choice of expanding all of the ads or just the individual ads you'd like to see. (This feature is implemented using standard features of HTML5 that are not supported in Internet Explorer or Edge.)
  • January 15, 2019: New Choir Directory listing and Choir Auditions ad for the Flushing Schiller Institute Community Chorus.
  • November 12, 2018: New Choir Directory listing and Choir Auditions ad for CantaNYC, a new choir directed by Claude Lévy.
  • October 31, 2018: New link for Music Books Plus, offering music and audio books, videos, CD-ROMs, DVDs, software and sheet music.
  • October 26, 2018: New Choir Directory listing and Choir Auditions ad for The Choir, a new community choir based in lower Manhattan that focuses on pop hits along with contemporary and classic Broadway tunes.
  • October 19, 2018: We've done some long-overdue housekeeping on the VAN Store page. Aside from freshening the look to be consistent with other pages on the site, we've restarted our Amazon Associates program. Once again, you can support VAN when you make purchases from Amazon by starting your shopping at the VAN Store. We've even got some new music and book recommendations.

Archive of old "New on VAN" items

SERVICES
See also the Info Exchange.
  • Need some exquisite beaded jewelry to complement your concert attire? Or perhaps a distinctive gift for that special singer in your life? Or maybe you'd like to host a jewelry show to benefit your favorite non-profit organization? Try Carnelian Knoll, where you'll find necklaces, bracelets and earrings of vintage beads and silver handcrafted by Julie Siegmund.
  • Looking for rehearsal space or performance venues? Try NYC Music Spaces, part of Fractured Atlas's SpaceFinder NYC database of available rehearsal and performance spaces for instrumental and vocal musicians. You'll find places to rent, from studios to large venues, for classical, jazz, rock--whatever you need to rehearse or perform in NYC.
  • Looking for an outstanding vocal ensemble coach? Mark Johnson, possessor of an amazing ear and terrific interpretive insights in a variety of styles, is available to coach your group. Contact Mark via e-mail.
  • Liz Fleischer's Sight-Singing Program is offered each season at the Kaufman Center (129 West 67th Street). Classes include ear-training, rhythm and pitch reading, music theory, basic notation and terminology, with emphasis on learning to hold a part with confidence. For more info, visit www.kaufman-center.org/lucyadults_mus_sight.htm, e-mail fleischerliz@aol.com or adultdivision@kaufman-center.org or call (212) 501-3362. The sight-singing program is just one of the classes offered by the Kaufman Center's Lucy Moses School.

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