For many, music is a reflection of individual and shared experiences, as well as the times in which we live.
That is especially true for members of Chicago a cappella, who found music shining a light on current circumstances when the world, and stages, were dark.
Chicago a cappella will present its second concert of the season, “Coming Out of the Dark,” with live performances throughout Chicagoland as well as a virtual event.
The concert will be performed at 8 p.m. Feb.11 at St. Josaphat Church in Chicago, 8 p.m. Feb. 12 at Nichols Concert Hall in Evanston, 8 p.m. Feb. 19 at Pilgrim Congregational Church in Oak Park, 4 p.m. Feb. 20 at Wentz Concert Hall in Naperville and at 7 p.m. March 3 during an online event.
Audience members must show proof of vaccination and masks are required.
The concert features music that inspired, comforted and uplifted ensemble members during the uncertainty of the pandemic.
“Part of what we need right now, and by we I mean all of us, is to just kind of make sense of what has happened,” Artistic Director John William Trotter said. “And also sort of remind ourselves and affirm what it is that gets us through difficulties like we’ve had.”
Trotter, who created and provided music direction for the concert, said the idea for the program came from a Zoom meeting with members of the ensemble in which they shared some of the their experiences during COVID.
“The stories people have, it’s amazing,” Trotter said. “All the different sorts of anxieties, loss and difficulty and isolation. And then of course, life has been turned upside down, so there’s some things for which we’re unexpectedly grateful in the middle of all that.”
He began thinking of all those stories and “how we’re all musicians and how it was pretty likely that we’re thinking of music while we’re all separated.”
He asked them which songs they found themselves turning to during a time of health challenges and sweeping cultural events including protests and demonstrations.
“Pieces that really gave them peace and comfort when we didn’t know what the next day would bring,” he said.
Those pieces helped shape the 18-song concert program, which includes centuries old works, popular music and two music premieres.
Among those that resonated with ensemble members was the “I Wish That I Knew How it Would Feel to be Free” by Billy Taylor, which served as an anthem during the Civil Rights movement.
“At least one of our singers has had some pretty disturbing experiences because of their race, just in the course of preparing for this program and others out in public,” Trotter said. “And that was part of that person’s COVID experience.”
For another singer, anxiety really spiked during the pandemic. Comfort was found in the song “The Blue Bird” written by Charles Villiers Stanford, “which is just so peaceful and ethereal,” he said.
Thomas Dorsey’s “Precious Lord,” which was one of Martin Luther King Jr.’s favorite hymns, was a song “which one of our singers hung onto in the course of the pandemic,” Trotter said.
Making their debuts during the concert are pieces by Sarai Hillman and Edna Yeh that were selected as winners of Chicago a cappella’s HerVoice Emerging Women Composers Competition. Chicago a cappella started the mentoring program and competition launched by the ensemble in 2020 as a way to seek out more music written by women.
“It just went gangbusters,” Trotter said of the competition. “We had 70 different folks send us music from a dozen countries.”
The “Coming Out of the Dark” concert will feature the world premieres of two of those pieces.
“I’m really excited about both of the pieces,” Trotter said. “They’re quite innovative and quite moving. They each have a very direct take on living through the very unusual time we’ve all been in.”
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Other works on the program include “Lamentations of Jeremiah” by Thomas Tallis, “Light of the Clear Blue Morning” by Dolly Parton and Shawn Kirchner’s arrangement of William Bradbury’s hymn “Angel Band.”
“(It’s) really sort of a soaring and extended meditation on hope and loss and how they’re all bound together,” Trotter said.
“One piece that choral people may recognize is Jake Runestad’s ‘Let My Love Be Heard,’ which is another really, really gorgeous, reflective soaring work that contemplates loss but also hope in a very present way,” he said.
While the concert addresses the hard times and challenges faced during the pandemic, the “Coming Out of the Dark” concert definitely ends on a positive and hopeful note, Trotter said.
“We have a lot of reasons to look ahead with hope,” Trotter said.
‘Coming Out of the Dark’ Chicago a cappella concert
When: 8 p.m. Feb. 11
Where: St. Josaphat, 2311 N. Southport Ave., Chicago
Tickets: $45 preferred seating; $33 general seating (all live concerts)
When: 8 p.m. Feb. 12
Where: Nichols Concert Hall, 1490 Chicago Ave., Evanston
When: 8 p.m. Feb. 19
Where: Pilgrim Congregational Church, 460 Lake St., Oak Park
When: 4 p.m. Feb. 20
Where: Wentz Concert Hall, 171 E. Chicago Ave., Naperville
Virtual concert
When: 7 p.m. March 3
Information: 773-281-7820; chicagoacappella.org
Kathy Cichon is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.