A late summer harvest from the garden. The end of one season, the beginning of another. Time for choir to begin!
Chicago Chorale will begin rehearsing for the 2021-22 season in just one week. Along with other ensembles in our area, and around the country, we plan a full season, with in-person rehearsals, a full schedule of concerts, and live audiences. It has been so long! since we sang together, listened closely to one another, learned new repertoire, experienced the transforming thrill of combining our talents for something so much bigger, so much better, than any one of us individually. It’ll take time for us to get to know one another again, to welcome and absorb our new singers (sixteen of them!), to reestablish our choral disciplines and feel like an ensemble; but the fundamental beauty and integrity of what we do— breathe life into the words, and into the lines and dots and spaces we see on the page, becoming the poets’ and composers’ voice— will catch us and buoy us up as we find ourselves once again.
Much will be different than it was two years ago. Every member of our group will be fully vaccinated against Covid; we will all wear masks during rehearsals, until the CDC and the City of Chicago tells us otherwise; we will sit in one spaced, single row, around the perimeter of our rehearsal space, rather than in three tight rows facing in one direction. We will have less time for rehearsal, more time for breaks. And we will not gather in tight groups to socialize. Some singers will be nervous and worried about the possibility of infection, and this may affect their enjoyment at being together again.
We’ll spend our first rehearsals rebuilding our sound— hearing voices with one another and placing them to establish our sections, assigning divisi past the normal SATB where the music requires it, listening for balance, hearing solo auditions. This kind of construction work happens every fall, and will be even more crucial after so long apart. It’ll take time and patience. But my fervent hope is that the beauty of the music we perform— some of it familiar and comfortable, in the spirit of the Christmas season; some of it new and challenging, in the spirit of Chorale— will invigorate us, imbue our efforts with confidence, and reawaken the wonder of live performance for our singers, and our listeners.
We will sing Advent Vespers at Monastery of the Holy Cross, in Bridgeport, on Saturday, December 4, at 5:15 PM. And we will present our Christmas concerts Saturday, December 11, 8 PM, at St. Michael’s, in Old Town; and Sunday, December 12, 3 PM, at St. Thomas the Apostle, in Hyde Park. Three acoustically splendid venues. We hope you’ll put us in your calendars, and hold these dates open to come and hear us.