Spring 2011

The Choral Union

a tradition of excellence

Cortland, NY

Back to Home Page

Stephen B. Wilson: Director
Alan Giambattista: piano

Email: wilsons@cortland.edu

Holiday Concert

3pm Sunday December 4, 2011
Dowd Fine Arts Theater
SUNY Cortland
Cortland, NY


Rebecca Farley Witty Stephen B. Wilson
CORTLAND, NY

Come and enjoy a festive, diverse holiday concert on Sunday, December 4 at 3:00 PM at Grace Episcopal-Holy Spirit Lutheran Church, 13 Court Street in Cortland. The SUNY Cortland Choral Union and Soprano Rebecca Farley Witty will perform stirring music for this eighth holiday concert presented by The Arts at Grace for the greater Cortland community. The program will conclude with interested audience members joining the Choral Union for the "Hallelujah Chorus" from Handel's Messiah. A reception for all will follow the performance.

Rebecca Farley Witty is a promising young soprano who recently earned a Masters in Voice Performance and Literature from the Eastman School of Music where she studied with Professor Carol Webber. There she received the Renee Fleming award and represented Eastman in the Kennedy Center's "Conservatory Project." In the summer of 2011, Witty was a Young Artist with the Des Moines Metro Opera Company for the second time. In October 2011, she made her professional orchestra debut with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra as the soprano soloist in Mahler's Second Symphony. Witty will sing "Gesu Bambino," "O Holy Night," "The Virgin's Slumber Song" and "Come Thou Long Expected Jesus" on December 4.

The Choral Union is a college-community choir consisting of Cortland students, faculty, and staff, plus many experienced singers from the Cortland area. The chorus is led by Dr. Stephen B. Wilson, Professor in the Department of Performing Arts. Since 1985, Wilson has led the ensemble in a wide variety of music. Recent triumphs include the 2010 Good Friday performance of J.S. Bach's entire St Matthew Passion with double chorus, double orchestra, and six soloists and the May 2011 production of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana. Well-respected local pianist Alan Giambattista accompanies Choral Union and contributes greatly to a foundation of excellent artistic collaboration and support.

Choral Union's December 4 program will include works by Josef Haydn, Gustav Holst, Alan Hovhaness, Emma Lou Diemer and Leanne Daharja Veitch with vocal solos by Breanna Schwartz, Valorie Xenakis, Charlotte Wallace, and Barbara Jo Williams. Bonnie Hutchinson, Alan Giambattista, and Stephen Wilson will be instrumentalists in selected numbers.

The Arts at Grace is a community outreach of Grace Episcopal-Holy Spirit Lutheran Church supported by individuals, businesses, and foundations from the greater Cortland community. Since a goal of the series is to make fine music accessible for all, there is never an admission fee. For more information, call (607) 753-3073 during business hours.

 

Texts and Translations:

Rehearsal Midi Files (not yet)

Midi files are small files that contain the notes, pitches and durations used to make music. These files are played by using the sythesizer on your computer's sound card.

Available at Cyberbass.com

Rehearsal Audio Files (mp3) (not yet)

MP3 files contain actual audio. They are compressed in order to take less space, but even so they are still BIG. The collection of files for each voice part totals about ?Megabytes. Using dialup, they take about as much time to download as they do to play (with these 32kbits/sec files). On the other hand, once you download them, you can put them on your mp3 player, etc.

These files can be downloaded to your computer by
      Windows: Right-Click on the file(s) that you want
      Mac: Control-Click on the file(s) that you want (I need to check this with a Mac user)

Back to: Choral Union Home Page

Link to: Cortland Music Website