Collegiate Choir Home Tour Concert
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Mar. 8, 2013
BLOOMINGTON, Ill. –On Tuesday, March 19, the Illinois Wesleyan University Collegiate Choir will present a concert at 8 p.m. at Wesley United Methodist Church (502 E. Front St., Bloomington).
The concert, free and open to the public, is one of 10 concerts performed on tour by the choir throughout the spring semester. Other performance locations have included: Peoria, Sterling and Barrington, Ill.; Monona, Wis.; Maplewood, Minn.; Winnipeg, Canada; Fargo, N.D.; Clive, Iowa and Delavan, Wis.
The Illinois Wesleyan University Collegiate Choir, directed by J. Scott Ferguson, director of choral activities, consists of 44 student musicians representing the School of Music and other areas of the University. The group, dedicated to performing the finest sacred and secular choral music from the past five centuries, also sponsors the IWU Commission Series, which has included in its 62-year history many significant pieces to the choral repertoire and has resulted in important world premieres at IWU. Student members are required to audition to join the choir and must maintain rigorous rehearsal schedules to prepare for the concert tour and other engagements throughout the year.
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The tour program includes literature from the Renaissance, Baroque, and contemporary eras. The concert will begin with three compositions from the English Renaissance and Baroque eras, composed by William Byrd, Henry Loosemore and Henry Purcell. Contrasting and following these works will be three 20th century compositions. The first work, Unruh der Zeit by Rudolph Mauersberger will be followed by Stránnoye Rozhdestvó vídevsche by Georgy Sviridov, and Krzysztof Penderecki’s Song of Cherubim.
The choir will also perform Five Flower Songs, Op. 47, by Benjamin Britten following the intermission.
The final portion of the concert will consist of works by contemporary American and British composers, the texts of which include images of fire. Hymn to the Creator of Light by John Rutter will be followed by Andrew Rindfleisch’s Lösch mir die Augen aus, the 2012-2013 commissioned work. The program will close with Fire! by John Orfe.
For additional information, contact the Illinois Wesleyan School of Music at (309) 556-3061.
Contact: Justin Feng, ‘15 (309) 556-3181, univcomm@iwu.edu