Peace and Joy

Join us for Peace and Joy, featuring works by a variety of composers and styles spanning the centuries, from the Renaissance to the 21st century, culminating in the world premiere performance of a new work by the Chorale’s Artistic Director Michael Austin Miller.

The program begins with music from the 16th century, Jacques Arcadelt’s iconic setting of Ave Maria, the classic Latin text asking Mary to pray for us, and continues through the years with holiday music familiar and not-so-familiar, sacred and secular. A highlight of the concert will be a performance of Mark Burrows’ arrangement of the haunting Ukrainian lullaby Oy Khodyt Son (The Dream Passes by the Window,) a meditation on a journey through the long, cold night to bring rest to the Christ Child.

Another featured work is Patterns on the Snow, written for treble voices, by award-winning contemporary singer/composer Mari Esabel Valverde. She describes the narrative as a dance in which “…we follow the ‘self’ through phases, through each of which there is an exhibit of heroic endurance”, a message which resonates with us today as the news from the world outside us can be dark and dispiriting.