After its extremely ambitious 80th-anniversary season last year, the North Shore Choral Society is back to its customarily high level of business as usual for the 2016-17 season — though its concert calendar does include several special features.
The 140-member musical group’s annual holiday concert, for example, will include collaboration with the Chicago Bronze English Handbell Ensemble. Its March program of “Psalms Old and New” will feature a harpist and a solo performance by the winner of its 2016 Donald Chen Young Artist Award. And, for its season finale, the group has responded to popular demand to repeat its 2014 performance of Paul Winter’s “Missa Gaia” (Earth Mass). The chorus will also collaborate with the Evanston Symphony Orchestra for two performances instead of its customary December concert of holiday music.
“It will be another year of our usual: a versatile and gorgeous repertoire, outstanding musicians and soloists, beautiful singing and collaboration with multiple music and arts groups,” said Linda Faller, vice president of communications. Faller also noted that the group’s director, Dr. Julia Davids, has organized the post-anniversary season around the theme of renewal.
Faller also couldn’t resist a backward glance at the 80th anniversary season, which included highlights such as in-concert narration by Kennette Benedict, senior advisor to the “Bulletin of Atomic Scientists” during its “Music of Peace” holiday concert, a guest appearance by the Kyoto Concert Choir for its “International Friendship” concert, and a climactic Chicago premiere of Larry Nickel’s “Requiem for Peace.”
“It was an extraordinary year of special concerts,” Faller said. “Especially the ‘Requiem for Peace,’ which I think was one of the most moving pieces we’ve ever performed.”
As usual, the group will perform its own program of holiday music Nov. 20 at Saint John Brebeuf Catholic Church in Niles, contrasted by a concert of more traditional and popular holiday music with the Evanston Symphony Orchestra Dec. 4 at Evanston Township High School. The NSCS concert, “New and Familiar Holiday Music for Choir Bells and Organ,” will feature John Rutter’s “Gloria,” Daniel Pinkham’s “Christmas Cantata” and a newly commissioned finale for choir and handbells, “Now Proclaim Messiah’s Birth,” by Chicago Bronze English Handbell Ensemble director Andrea Handley.
The choir’s March 5 program, “Psalms Old and New,” also performed at Saint John Brebeuf Church, will feature Leonard Bernstein’s “Chichester Psalms” and Tarik O’Regan’s “Dorchester Canticles. Solo performers will include harpist Ben Melsky, treble William Lewis and Donald Chen Award winner Nathan Ward. (The Donald Chen Award is an annual competitive prize given in honor of the longtime North Shore Choral Society director.)
For its season finale, the chorus will reprise its 2014 performance of Winter’s contemporary “Missa Gaia” in honor of Earth Day April 22 at the Unitarian Church of Evanston. An environmental liturgy of contemporary music, “Missa Gaia” requires a choir, a soloist (soprano Felicia Patton), instrumental accompaniment featuring Jim Gailloreto on soprano saxophone and jazz piano by Thomas W. Jefferson and the recorded calls of wolves, whales and loons. The performance will also feature The Dance Center of Evanston, directed by Bea Rashid, and the Evanston Children’s Choir, directed by Gary Geiger.
After the close of its official season, the chorus will also perform for a second time with the Evanston Symphony Orchestra June 11 at Northwestern University’s Pick-Staiger Concert Hall. The group will sing the choral finale to Mahler’s second symphony, “Resurrection.”
“One of the things I love about the choir is that we’re very collaborative,” said Faller. “We’re always stretching ourselves, we’re always growing, musically.
“We’re unusual in that we do a wide variety of music—from the classic repertoire to gospel to swing and so on. Although some people would rather stick to the classical repertoire, I think many of us really enjoy new challenges.”
North Shore Choral Society’s ‘New and Familiar Holiday Music for Choir Bells and Organ’
More Top Picks Best Ventless Propane Heaters
When: 3 p.m. Nov. 20
Where: Saint John Brebeuf Catholic Church, 8307 N. Harlem Ave., Niles
Tickets: $25, $22 for seniors, $15 for students.
Contact: 773-956-8400; www.northshorechoral.org