SMC choir to perform at Carnegie Hall
By NELLIE WILLIAMS
News Writer
Saint Mary's students and alumnae will perform this weekend at the same place Rachmaninov sang and Tchikovsky conducted.
On Sunday, Nov. 21 at 2 p.m., the Saint Mary's Women's Choir along with Penn High School Women's Chorale, will perform a concert in Carnegie Hall. Saint Mary's and Penn High School are meeting up with 65 other singers in New York, making the total number of performers 170. The students will leave Thursday and arrive back next Monday.
"I think we're ready," said Nancy Menk, chair of the music department and the leader of the Saint Mary's Women's choir. "It's just a matter of getting together with all the other performers."
In addition to the students, 40 Saint Mary's alumnae will be coming from around the country to join the singers.
"[The alumnae] add maturity of voices," said Menk. "They all sang consistently in their four years here. They have strong voices."
The performance will include works from Hayden and Williams from different selections in the Magnificat text, a piece commissioned for the college Sesquicentennial in 1994 by Libby Larsen, and Brahms' Ave Maria and Opus 12.
The New England Symphonic Ensemble will provide musical accompaniment. The voice ensemble will have eight hours of rehearsal time together before the performance, but only one hour with the orchestra.
Although she will be missing her last Notre Dame home football game as a student, senior Kathy Steinlaje is very excited about the performance.
"It's an awesome opportunity. A lot of people have families coming, so that makes it even more special," Steinlaje said.
"This is unreal in some ways," said Mary Dini, a Notre Dame grad student who graduated from Saint Mary's two years ago with a music minor. "It's been exciting especially when you tell people about it. One of the pieces we're performing [Canticle of Mary] was commissioned in 1994. I was in the choir when we first premiered the piece. It's great that more people will be able to hear it."
All News Stories for Tuesday, November 16, 1999
