ArtsSF

MILL VALLEY, CA—Singing on pitch with no instrumental guidance is the trademark of the all-male Chanticleer ensemble, back home in Northern California for some dozen holiday concerts by these dozen male virtuosos of the ever-changing “Chanticleer Christmas” program. The wondrous group is offering holiday pieces written at the time of Columbus’ journeys right up to living composers and modern spirituals, spanning at least seven nations and three languages. The very breadth of the repertory changing every year is mind-boggling. The…

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BERKELEY, CA—One of the newest and most versatile early-music singing groups locally is Tactus SF, now seven years old, affiliated with the San Francisco Early Music Society. Mention “early music” and you expect to hear polyphonic from Europe. Not so, this time. This 20-member a cappella group put together an entire program of early New-World music, “Cantus Mexicanus,” digging out sacred renaissance choral music of “New Spain,” as it was then called—-music that we almost never get to hear, part…

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Ukraine and Mozart, an unlikely coupling indeed, paired to light up Davies Hall Aug. 18 in a gratifying choral-orchestral concert under Robert Geary. Geary’s S.F. Choral Society linked with Ukrainian composer Alexander Shchetynsky, 63, from afar unveiling his Requiem (1991-2004), a serene lyrical outpouring with string orchestra. However somber a work, the composer establishes a mellifluous flow in his work with Latin text, closer to the spirit of Brahms’ Requiem. Among his original touches was the “Lacrimosa,” with choral sound…

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WALNUT CREEK, CA— With his audacious programming, credit veteran Director Robert Geary for pushing his Volti Chamber Singers a hair beyond. While Volti is not the most accomplished of our many chamber choruses, it is arguably the most adventurous. In their current concert set of five a capella works, the oldest one was two years old. Many a chorus (perhaps like one you’ve been in) manages four-part harmony, perhaps with keyboard accompaniment. But here there are eight-part unaccompanied harmonies, along…

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When spirits sag lowest in the darkest of December, we always compensate by getting a shot in the arm via the Chanticleer holiday program. I’d say it’s virtually guaranteed; even when a couple of the dozen singers get respiratory ailments, as this month, the show goes on full-force, with Music Director Tim Keeler stepping in as designated hitter to provide yet another countertenor voice. Chanticleer provides amazing performance in an unusually broad Nativity-oriented repertory hard to find these days, some…

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After a good (or, more accurately, bad) year’s Covid absence, the Chanticleer singers were back once more in exemplary form, and we can properly celebrate Christmas again with their predictably profound and joyful sounds. The dozen male vocalists—the only ones in the entire hall without masks—won sustained ovations Sunday from the crowd at the Cathedral of Christ the Light in Oakland as well as from Bishop Michael Barber in his low-key attendance as just one of many fans in the…

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NEW YORK CITY—It’s as if none of us had ever heard a youth chorus before—Hundreds of youngsters, age 9 on up, on stage singing, gyrating, dancing, all on pitch, despite flying about as if in a Broadway musical. It left one battle-hardened music critic nearby captivated, driven to pounding on a thigh in time to the swelling rhythms. The whole show was enough to move this writer to tears of sheer joy rarely shed. This was the prize-winning multi-racial, multi-cultural…

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