Fall Tour Unites Audiences with "Songs of Love and Loss"
University Choir and Chamber Singers to tour Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan October 17–19
CHICAGO (October 3, 2014) — Dr. Julia Davids has always believed in the power of music to bring people together. “Two of the most notable human experiences are love and loss,” she says. “For centuries composers have been compelled to express these intense emotions through song.” Given this core human condition, Davids says, these themes can easily unite us, and musical works help us find areas of commonality and resolution. “We might not all agree on many things, but we all know what it feels like to love and to lose someone we love.”
For Davids, North Park University’s director of choral activities and Stephen J. Hendrickson Associate Professor of Music, selecting “Songs of Love and Loss” as the theme for this fall’s University Choir and Chamber Singers tour wasn’t a difficult decision. “There is so much music that fits under the umbrella of ‘Love and Loss,’” she says. “For this tour program, we have endeavored to bring together some of the finest standard choral works as well as some newer additions to the canon. There’s a wide variety of music and emotions that the choirs get to display.”
The tour repertoire includes pieces that will appeal to attendees of all ages, from the high school students the University choirs will be working with, to the retirement community residents the choirs will perform for. The University Choir and Chamber Singers will tour Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan over Fall Break, performing at three churches, Covenant Village of the Great Lakes, and LaPorte High School.
“We always enjoy getting to share our music with other communities,” says Davids. “I try to include music that may be familiar as well as something that will stretch both the audience and the performers,” she says about tour programming. “For this tour, new music meets old, with lots of gorgeous singing and emotional understanding.”
More than 40 North Park students will participate in the tour, representing the University’s undergraduate and graduate music programs. “I'm very much looking forward to highlighting the wonderful student singers as well as University Orchestra cellist Francisco Malespin, who will play with a new song cycle called Snow Angel,” Davids says. Pianist Cristina Wilkinson Salamea will also join staff accompanist Myron Silberstein on selected pieces.
According to Davids, the five-movement Snow Angel “weaves together stories of love and light, rebirth and rejuvenation, through song and narration.” Written by emerging Canadian composer Sarah Quartel in 2003, the piece “highlights the strength and beauty that a child’s voice can bring to our often-troubled world,” she says.
“Sacred love—the love of God—is at the center of much great choral music,” Davids says. Whether written for church use (such as pieces by Bach and Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina) or as concert pieces (like those by Ola Gjeilo and Hall Johnson), the program’s featured selections reflect the natural expression of love for God through singing. “We have also included two sorts of pieces that communicate love for each other.” Works by Brahms, Georges Bizet, and James Mulolland feature poetry about romantic love set to music, while songs by John Tavener and Daniel Gawthrop can ease the experience of losing a loved one.
To close the performances, the choirs will invite alumni and those connected to the University community to join in singing “Children of the Heavenly Father.”
The choirs will begin their tour in Indiana on October 17 with clinics for choral students at LaPorte High School. “Dr. Davids generally conducts workshops by having North Park and high school students sing together and work on vocal technique, her area of specialty,” says School of Music Director of Operations Dr. Rebecca Ryan. “Mostly what happens is that Julia works her magic! Our students will then sing for LaPorte, and the LaPorte choir may sing for our students in a ‘concert exchange.’”
On October 19, the choirs will participate in two worship services at Forest Park Covenant Church in Muskegon, Mich., the home church for many North Park University and Theological Seminary students. Last August, the University Alumni Association hosted an event in Grand Rapids, Mich., at which Malespin gave a cello performance. He connected with alumni who attend Forest Park, providing a catalyst for retunrning to it as a destination on the fall tour. Representatives from the Office of Alumni Relations will be available at each tour performance to connect with alumni.
Performances are free and open to the public:
- Friday, October 17, 7:00 pm, at Harbert Community Church, Sawyer, Mich.
- Sunday, October 19, 9:30 and 11:15 am, at Forest Park Covenant Church, Muskegon, Mich.
- Sunday, October 19, 6:00 pm, at Trinity Evangelical Covenant Church, Oak Lawn, Ill.
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