A preview of our 2017-2018 Season!

Friday, October 20, 2017 – 8pm – Bavaria and Beer
Friday and Sunday, December 8 & 10, 2017 – 8pm & 4pm – Gloria!
Saturday, March 10, 2018 –  7:30pm – We the People
Saturday, May 12, 2018 – 7:30pm – Bach St. John’s Passion

We’re mixing it up a bit this season with four exciting concerts full of incredibly engaging and diverse repertoire. The major work in May will be a performance of J.S. Bach’s masterwork, the Johannespassion and will feature Grammy-winner Dann Coakwell as our Tenor Soloist and Evangelist. We will again combine with the Santa Clara University Choirs to present this incredible work in the repertoire. The Bach will not be the only major Baroque work we perform next season, and we will begin our study of the period with a performance of Vivaldi’s Gloria in December. With a string quartet on hand, we’ll reprise Whitacre’s Five Hebrew Love Songs and also perform an incredibly compelling modern work by Ola Gjeilo, Luminous Night of the Soul, that features string quartet and piano. This will of course be alongside some traditional carols and some holiday favorites.

Our October and March concerts are a bit more out of the box. In October, we will sing a concert of frivolity and drinking songs and hope to partner with some local breweries and beer events to do some really interesting cross-promotion. The centerpiece of the concert is Elgar’s Scenes from the Bavarian Highlands which is a picturesque and dancing set of pieces not too dissimilar to the Brahms Liebeslieder Waltzer. The Tenors and Basses will reprise In Taberna from Orff’s Carmina Burana, and we may even lead the audience in a few pub songs.

In March, we the choir will perform a concert about We the People, and the diversity that makes up America, through folk and global music. Some song categories we will explore include the African American Spiritual, Latin American pieces, Indian Raga, and some folksong arrangements by Chinese-American composer Chen Yi. Some familiar favorites will be mixed in to round out a program that is meaningful, fun, accessible, and as diverse as the American choral tradition. And as America itself.