Concert of the Yale Schola Cantorum

Event time: 
Friday, February 3, 2012 - 12:15pm
Event description: 

Sung Evening Prayer

Music by Holst, Pärt, Bach, Nystedt, Distler, and Gesualdo

Andrew Megill, guest conductor

Thomas Troeger, preaching

 

United Church on the Green

Temple at Elm


 

Guest conductor Andrew Megill will direct Yale Schola Cantorum in a special evensong service on Friday, February 3 at 5:15 pm in United Church on the Green. Thomas H. Troeger, Lantz Professor of Christian Communication at Yale Divinity School and the Institute of Sacred Music, will preach.

The choir will present Holst’s Nunc Dimittis; a Magnificat by Pärt; Bach’s motet Lobet den Herrn; ”O Crux” by Knut Nystedt; “Fuerwahr, er trug unsere Krankheit” by Distler; and the “Aestimatus sum” from the Tenebrae Responsories by Gesualdo.

Andrew Megill is recognized as one of the leading choral conductors of his generation, known for his passionate artistry and unusually wide-ranging repertoire, extending from early music to newly-composed works.

Dr. Megill has prepared choruses for many of the world’s leading orchestras and conductors.  He has collaborated with the American Composers Orchestra under Dennis Russell Davies (Beethoven and Glass); the American Symphony under Leon Botstein (works by Shostakovich and Prokofiev; the American premiere of Weill’s Eternal Road, parts III and IV; Rachmaninov’s The Bells and the American premiere of Einojuhani Rautavaara’s On The Last Frontier; a concert of works by Frederich Nietzsche and Frederic Delius; and a concert of twelve-tone music by Eisler and Henze); the Cleveland Orchestra under Pierre Boulez (Wagner’sParsifal); the Dresden Philharmonic under Rafael Fruhbeck de Burgos (Brahms’ Requiem); the National Symphony under Zdenek Macal (Verdi Requiem); the New Jersey Symphony under Neemi Jaarvi (Brahms’ Requiem); the New York Philharmonic under Charles Dutoit (Berlioz La Damnation de Faust) and Alan Gilbert (Handel’s Messiah); the Spoleto Festival Orchestra under Joseph Flummerfelt and Emmanuel Villaume; and the Mark Morris Dance Company under Jane Glover (Handel’s L’Allegro) and Craig Smith (Virgil Thompson’s Four Saints in Three Acts).

Since 1989, Dr. Megill has served as Artistic Director of Fuma Sacra, Ensemble-in-residence at Westminster Choir College of Rider University, recognized as “one of America’s leading professional ensembles specializing in Renaissance and Baroque vocal music” whose performances leave the audience “gasping in amazement” (Classical New Jersey). Dr. Megill is also Music Director of the Masterwork Chorus, one of metropolitan New York’s finest volunteer choirs.  With Masterwork, Dr. Megill has conducted the major choral-orchestral repertoire in the regions finest halls, including Avery Fisher and Carnegie Halls.

He returns to Yale for the third time to guest conduct the Yale Schola Cantorum, the University’s renowned chamber choir founded in 2003 by Simon Carrington.

The Evensong is open to the public; no tickets are required. For more information, call 203-432-5062.