(Posted October 26, 2015)

The Juniata Concert Choir will perform its fall concert at 3 p.m., Sunday, Nov. 1 in Rosenberger Auditorium in the Halbritter Center for the Performing Arts.
The Juniata Concert Choir will perform its fall concert at 3 p.m., Sunday, Nov. 1 in Rosenberger Auditorium in the Halbritter Center for the Performing Arts.

HUNTINGDON, Pa. -- Composers and arrangers of the 20th century will be the focus of the fall Juniata College Concert Choir concert, which also features accompaniment by 21st century musicians (Juniata students), at 3 p.m., Sunday, Nov. 1 in Rosenberger Auditorium in the Halbritter Center for the Performing Arts.

The concert is free and open to the public. The Juniata Concert Choir is directed by Russell Shelley, Elma Stine Heckler Professor of Music.

The musical program begins with "Muié Rendêra," by Carlos Alberto Pinto Fonesca, a composer known for his adaptations of Brazilian folk music. "Come Ready and See Me," is by Richard Hundley, who was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and composed songs for opera singers and vocal groups throughout his career.

Next, the choir will perform "The Argument," by Francis J. Nesta, which turns an argument between a man and a woman into music sung between the men's section and the women's section. "Remember" from "Two Rossetti Songs" by Stephen Chatman, bases its text from poems by "Inferno" poet Dante Gabriel Rossetti.


The ensemble will then perform "In Remembrance," by Jeffery L. Ames, a song composed in memory of two students killed in a car accident. Juniata student Adam Rothstein, a sophomore from Huntingdon, Pa, will provide accomaniment playing French horn. Following that is "Of Crows and Clusters," by Norman Dello Joio, an Italian-American composer who received a Pulitzer Prize and an Emmy Award for his choral music compositions.


The group then sings "The Wayfaring Stranger" from "The Sacred Harp," an American folk melody arranged by Stephen Caracciolo, followed by "There Will Be Rest," by Dale Warland, a Minnesota composer who based the song on a poem by Sara Teasdale. Juniata senior Katie Jeffress, of Corpus Christi, Texas, will accampany the choir on flute on the Warland selection.


The next selection, "Brennan On the Moor," arranged by Bruce Trinkley, tells the story of a young Irish highwayman who "took from the rich and gave to the poor." Following that is "Salseo," by Oscar Galián, a composer from Puerto Rico, and "Go Where I Send Thee," arranged by Paul Caldwell and Sean Ivory, best known as a Christmas song covered by rock singer Natalie Merchant.

The vocal ensemble will then sing "Homeward Bound," by Carl Strommen, a composer and educator who teaches at Long Island University-Post, followed by "Song for the Mira" by Allister MacGillivray, a Nova Scotian composer who wrote the song for the Mira River in Nova Scotia's Cape Breton region.

The concert ends with "Cindy," a classic American folk song arranged by Mack Wilberg, accompanied on xylophone by Emily Reinl, a senior from Mechanicsburg, Pa. and on four-hand piano by Cathy Scafidi, lecturer in music at Juniata and a resident of State College, Pa.

The Juniata Concert Choir is one of three choirs performing at the college. The 50-person choir tours every spring semester, focusing its program on historical sacred music. Juniata choirs have performed at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City, the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., and St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York City. Recent tours have taken the choir to Germany in 2015, China in 2014, Guatemala in 2013 and Ireland and Northern Ireland in 2012.

Contact April Feagley at feaglea@juniata.edu or (814) 641-3131 for more information.