[Toastmasters] Follow Up: Pacific Chorale's American Masterpieces Choral Festival

[Jerry McMillan]

"To sing like this, in the company of other souls, and to make those consonants slip out so easily and in unison, and to make those chords so rich that they bring tears to your eyes. This is transcendence. This is the power that choral singing has that other music can only dream of." --Garrison Keillor

At our meeting last week, Jeannine made an announcement about Pacific Chorale's American Masterpieces Choral Festival, which takes place this week with free events Tuesday and Wednesday evenings at 7:00 at the Renee and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall (at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa). I encourage all of you who have any interest in choral music, music in general, or who just want a wonderful evening surrounded by glorious sound to consider attending one or both of these events.

Tuesday evening, there will be a short performance by the 160-voice, semi-professional Pacific Chorale, but the main part of the evening will be an event led by legendary American musician Alice Parker, who will lead a community "Sing." I have not attended any of her events before, but everybody I've talked to who has says they are truly memorable. She engages everybody in the hall in group singing, giving the entire community the experience of choral singing so eloquently expressed by Garrison Keillor in the quote above. There are no requirements to participate; you don't have to read music, and people who think their voices are marginal (or terrible) are absolutely welcome. Come experience the transcendent excitement of choral singing without any of the pressure of being in a choir!

Wednesday evening will begin with a 40-minute performance by Pacific Chorale, representing a wide range of American composers. If you haven't heard the Chorale, this is a great opportunity to hear one of the best musical organizations in Southern California (did I mention it's free?), in one of the best acoustical settings in which I've ever sung (and I've sung in some good ones!). The second half of the program will feature a performance by the Festival Chorus, a group of (we were told) 502 singers, including Pacific Chorale and members of Orange County college, church, and community choirs. We rehearsed all day Saturday, and I'm very excited about the amount and quality of sound this ensemble can produce.

Once again, I encourage all of you to attend both or one of these exciting events. It's not often you have the opportunity to experience musical events of this quality for this extremely low price (I think I've mentioned by now that it's free). If you have any questions, I'd be happy to try and answer them for you. There is also more information on the Chorale's Website, pacificchorale.org.

I hope to see you waving at me when I'm on stage,
Jerry
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://maillists.uci.edu/mailman/public/toastmasters/attachments/20080421/0c848d56/attachment.html