Singing City, the name Elaine Brown chose when she founded her chorus 60 years ago, encapsulated her vision of music’s cohesive social power but also reflected a cultural tradition that antedated Europeans’ landing in America. Her shared vision was of a city held close by groups singing in clubs, in churches, in concert halls, in schools, in cellars, singing in many languages, singing everywhere.
Choir Crazy
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BY DANIEL WEBSTER
There was abundant evidence for her vision. Amateur choruses had existed in Philadelphia from its earliest days. German male choruses, church choirs singing Handel or Palestrina; Moravians drawing on ancient German traditions to bolster their courage in a new world; Swedish choirs, freed slaves singing powerfully of lost heritages, Huguenots preserving their French ties through song, Italians singing nostalgically and proudly their operatic choruses. Choirs represented their cultural histories, keeping memories alive, reinvigorating musical and cultural values. The pattern continues, but in ever shifting ways. The Bethlehem Bach Choir is well past the century mark; the Mendelssohn Club Choir is looking hopefully toward its 150th year in Philadelphia; the Orpheus Club sings into its 134th year. Colleges and universities have fielded choirs and glee clubs almost from their founding. Others struggle for stability, for choral singing is mainly amateur singing, and the pressures of personal schedules—work, school, travel, personal travail—defeat many singers who would rather be exploring Bach than working overtime. And a peculiarly American bias ranks choral singing below instrumental performance. It’s not the 134-year old Mendelssohn Club that towers over Philadelphia music; it is the 107-year-old Philadelphia Orchestra. Choirs continue as the voice of social change. Singing City has bashed through national hatreds—singing in Israel and the West Bank at a time when such crossings were unheard of; taking black, white, and Asian singers to sing in the South before the Civil rights marches. Working men’s choirs of the 1930s have given way to others. The Gay Men’s Choir and the Anna Crusis Choir have taken on gender issues as the propelling force in music making. Afro-American church choirs have long sung the anger of discrimination and the militant hope of equality. Orthodox Church choirs help Ukrainian and Russian immigrants preserve ties with their deep musical history, language and homeland. The Korean-American Chorale and the Chinese Musical Voices preserve their historic music. Choirs have responded to changing musical tastes, and many have furthered those changes. Jazz, pop styles, country, rap, and Beatles songs have all leavened programs and challenged the standard repertoire. Mendelssohn Club and Temple University choir conductor Alan Harler said, “Don’t get me wrong. I love the big masterpieces—but we’ve done them. Give us new things.” The Philadelphia Boy Choir’s artistic director, Jeff Smith, conducts only American music at home. That means ballads, anthems, folk music, Bernstein, Copland, Rodgers and Hammerstein, Lerner and Loewe. On international tours, the choir sings some pieces in the language of the host countries—Chinese, Spanish, Arabic, whatever. The relative newcomer in this resounding amateur scene is the professional choir. Musical activist Michael Korn worked years to create the Philadelphia Singers, a 32-voice ensemble with singers under contract. He achieved his goal 14 years ago, just before his death. The ensemble continues under David
Hayes. Hayes protests that “paid choristers” is perceived by would-be funders as an oxymoron. “People tell us: ‘Everybody can sing. Why pay them?’” Hayes reports. Hayes’ aspirations and drive have carried the singers to a level of success that fits choral singing in America: survival. Yes, they sing and sometimes record with the Philadelphia Orchestra, but finan-
cial pressure caused the ensemble to reduce its season last year and continue that austerity path this year. “I’m amazed at the flow of really fine singers available,” he says. “The conservatories and universities are turning out far more singers than can be absorbed by existing professional ensembles. We’re making slow strides in changing the ideas of conventional music making. Singers in our ensemble also have to teach, to sing in church choirs, and to job around. It’s a strange life. “Our goal is to raise the profile of all choruses,” he says while recalling the anger the Singers created when they were named official chorus of the Orchestra. Until that happened, the Orchestra parceled out its choral concerts among Singing City, the Choral Arts Society and Mendelssohn Club. Things
Page 14: Singing City Page 15, clockwise from top left: The Choral Arts Society Of Philadelphia The Mendelssohn Club Of Philadelphia The Philadelphia Singers
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CHOIR CRAZY
Left to right: The Philadelphia Gay Men’s Choir; The Brockington Ensemble; The Wilmington Chester Mass Choir; Chinese Musical Voices; The Philadelphia Boys Choir
fell apart during Riccardo Muti’s tenure with the Orchestra; a former conductor of the Mendelssohn Club provided a chorus which Muti angrily said was unrehearsed. The Orchestra turned to the Westminster Choir, ending that important community connection with amateur choirs. Korn had envisioned forming a chorus specifically for the Orchestra, and had enlisted Riccardo Muti’s and Wolfgang Sawallisch’s support. The Singers and the larger—and older—Singers Chorale were in; the three city choirs were out. The Singers performed in Muti’s final concerts as music director, sang Sawallisch’s major choral concerts, and continues in Christoph Eschenbach’s season. This year, the ensembles will sing Mahler’s Symphony No. 2 and traditional Holiday music with the Orchestra. Hayes will lead Bach, Israel in Egypt, and its “Christmas in Logan Square” programs on its own. The Singers’ budget is $415,000, with only one fulltime staff member, Rebecca Bolden. Like some other local choruses, the Singers received Pew Foundation support
disguise, Harler points out. “It freed us to plan our seasons independently and to be more adventurous. We’ve commissioned 30 pieces. The board believes in my craziness, and the singers believe in the chorus.” Harler notes the choir, which employs 8 to 10 professionals, will sing Orff’s Carmina Burana along with a commissioned work by Jan Krzywicki based on bits of Carmina. All this with the Leah Stein Dance Company. They keep to tradition with Mendelssohn’s Elijah with tenor Stuart Neill in the spring. The schismatic Choral Arts Society survived and prospered, first under Sean Deibler, then Donald Nally and now under Matthew Glandorf. It, too, shared in the Philadelphia Orchestra’s bounty, but rode out the change programming classics. It marks its 25th anniversary this season and has no problem recruiting—and losing—singers. “We were founded by singers who wanted to perform with the Orchestra,” says Peter Grandell, executive di-
era long attracted singers who loved the stage, knew the repertoire and stayed with the company for a lifetime. Its conductors have had to choose between experience and younger voices, but critics have agreed the OCP chorus has gained stature in the last decade. Prominent in the choral mix is the Philadelphia Boys Choir. Willed into being 29 years ago by Robert Hamilton, the ensemble has become the city’s traveling ambassador. It has its own home and rehearsal hall near 30th Street Station. The boys pay $700 tuition and pay for their part in tours, often $2,000 and more. The ensemble of 90 boys and 30 men in the Chorale have visited all civilized continents, touching down in China, Africa, South America and extensively in the middle East and Europe. This year, they sing in Greece and Turkey, staying in homes of families to gain experience in life elsewhere. Jeffrey Smith, music director, oversees a $600,000 budget and guides a staff of two full-time and four part-time administrators. He says the ensemble is restructuring, and will add a develop-
and the Loce Fellowship Ensemble in a program with the Brockington Ensemble and the Blair Brothers produced an audience almost entirely Afro-American. “We worked with churches here and the response was tremendous.” A second season in 2004-5 followed the same formula with Dottie Peoples and the David Winslow Singers. “One of our best programs was having Cool Bernie and the Choir College here for three days. We had workshops, and the churches really turned out for it. We had Pew Foundation support for those programs, and that let us discount tickets for the churches. We want to keep this going, but we need solid funding to let us make it easy for our audience to be there,” he says. At Mother Bethel Church in Society Hill, M. Barry Currington leads two adult choirs and a children’s ensemble. The pastor Jeffrey Heath says, “People are hungry for this music—it’s part of our experience—but they don’t want the old. Many of our hymns are outdated. We have one choir singing old Gospel. But the churches are singing
to sort out its administration and to coordinate its outreach programs. Pew recognized that almost all the choruses shared problems of fund raising, management, promotion and development. The Mendelssohn Club is a survivor, too. When Alan Harler was engaged as artistic director 20 years ago, “The chorus had a $60,000 deficit and only about 60 singers remained.” The former conductor’s policies led half the chorus to leave and found the Choral Arts Society. “But our singers were not going to let this group die. The force of history was at work, and I saw that strength in the chorus. We got out of debt, mostly through negotiation, and have stayed on an even keel since then.” The chorus has a budget of $285,000, according to Lynn Faust, the only paid staff leader. The singers, like most chorus members, pay dues, or membership fees every year and buy their own music. Choristers fund their own art. Faust points out the endemic problems of amateur choruses: 15% turnover every year and low recognition. Harler says the chorus misses the Philadelphia Orchestra link which attracted singers and gave the chorus visibility. “Still, we sing with the Orchestra at Saratoga—a different management—and we sing repertoire at home with an orchestra, things we might have sung with the Philadelphia Orchestra.” Losing the Orchestra connection proved an advantage in
rector. “We’re proud that we did in our very first season. But we realized the Orchestra was not our only gig. We wanted an independent season, and we’re in the middle of a long-term rethink about who we are. We don’t need a symphonic-size choir; we can have a leaner organization that performs another repertoire. I think we have found our niche. We do music not often heard. That gives us our unique character.” Deibler keeps a tie with the city with his a capella Music Group. Not all choruses are urban products. Valentin Radu, the Romanian pianist and conductor, founded Vox Ama Deus 20 years ago in Devon. The choir and orchestra have made baroque works the focus, using period instruments in the orchestra and scholarly singing styles. Radu’s high energy has attracted top singers, and the ensemble has recorded some of the Bach and Handel works. He will lead 12 concerts this season, including Dido and Aeneas and the full-romantic Verdi Requiem at the Kimmel Center. This 20th season has programs of Mozart, Bach, a Renaissance Christmas and a Viennese bill. Professional singers gravitate to the Opera Company of Philadelphia now that its season is longer. Conflicting dates sometimes make singers have to decide whether to sing the opera or with the Philadelphia Singers. The Op-
ment director and then an executive director. A tour of the region reveals a wealth of church-related choir singing, but also community programs: the Bucks County Choral Society, The Mastersingers in Montgomery County, choirs at county Community Colleges, the Mary Green Singers in Kennett Square, and church choirs. No one has counted how many people sing in weekend church and synagogue services. A big part of that is in Gospel music. It is a tidal wave of music. Churches and virtually every university and college in the region has a Gospel choir—even Eastern Mennonite University. Prominent Gospel choirs include the Wilmington-Chester Mass Choir, the Philadelphia Gospel Choir, the Antioch Baptist Church Choir, the choir at St. Thomas AE Church, the Love Fellowship, the Brockington Ensemble, the Freedom Choir, and the David Winslow Singers. A Gospel choir sang in the Philadelphia Bach Festival in 1998. Others have appeared with the Philly Pops, with the Philadelphia Orchestra, and in series at the Annenberg center. That series, beginning in 2004, brought nationally known soloists with local ensembles and produced sellout crowds at Irvine Auditorium. Roy Wilbur, associate director of Penn Presents, says matching Hezekiah Walker
fewer of the great old anthems.” The church founded the children’s choir to teach musicianship. “Youngsters just don’t know harmony and singing. We’re trying.” Singing City? The name resonates. The choir with that name maintains Elaine Brown’s vision and vitality with Jeffrey Brillhart, its third music director. The 110-voice choir honors women composers in its first concert, and will perform with Dave Brubeck later. The group actively helps in schools, offering mentoring for young singers and supporting teenaged composers. It takes singing to settings all over the city. “We come for the music, but stay for the Mission,” says Angela Bleckener, the administrator.
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Daniel Webster was music critic for the Philadelphia Inquirer from 1964 to 1999.
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