The Phoenix Bach Choir: from amateur to professional

Professional Choirs in America: The Phoenix Bach Choir

Choirs are made up of beautiful voices, but they cannot perform unless there are several cohesive elements, locale, conductor, music and support. Choral conducting is a highly creative, but delicately balanced combination of talents. The conductor must tend to the needs of the singers, the audience for which he or she works and their own personal and artistic goals, meanwhile grappling with the demands of the music and the composer's intention in the performance of music. Choirs are made up of individual singers, each one responsible for their voice, experience and goals. Choral conductors, on the other hand may voice loudly their own experience, but they are personally embracing their career, whether or not it is successful, with passion and time. They must collaborate with others, encourage the qualities of their best singers, and challenge them to become perfect. The Choir must be constantly reminded of how demanding the conductor is that the music is performed exactly as he or she wishes in order to continue to grow in skill and knowledge. In this paper we will examine how some conductors and choirs were able to rise above the rank of the amateur and become highly paid professionals.

The Phoenix Bach Choir and the Kansas City Chorale have been directed by Artistic Director Charles Bruffy, who sometimes brings together the two professional choirs for performances in Texas, California and Arizona, a feat for which they are much-anticipated by the local audience for their music through collaboration.

Doctors Hal and Timona Pittman first brought the Bach and Madrigal Society together as a study group of fine choral music, made up of performers and devotees. The Phoenix Bach Choir grew out of this in 1958 as a study group of fine Baroque and Renaissance periods music. The Pittman living room was their first rehearsal space. Becoming a professional choir was not easy. It has taken 47 years and several conductors to reach the status which they now enjoy. Beginning with Vance George of the San Francisco Symphony Chorus, they were led next by Anders hrwall of the Swedish Radio Choir & Stockholm Bach Choir. Jon Washburn of the Vancouver Chamber Choir was the next to lead them and now they are under the direction of Charles Bruffy, who also leads the Kansas City Chorale. The growth of this choir from study group to being in demand everywhere in the United States, has been tremendous, but has taken much work and dedication on the parts of the members and conductor.

There are many choirs in the United States who aspire to the status of the Phoenix Bach Choir and there are, fortunately, many groups willing to lend a hand to these groups who need support. The Margaret Hillis Award for Choral Excellence, who founded the Chicago Symphony Chorus, presents an annual prize of $5,000 to one outstanding member ensemble. "Eligibility rotating through a three-year cycle: children/youth choruses (2008), professional and professional-core choruses (2009), and adult volunteer choruses (2010). A chorus may win this award only once." The Chorus America awards honor artistic growth, adventurous programming, creative excellence, outreach, generous philanthropy and selfless service to communities on the parts of choruses all across America. Past recipients have been:

2007 the New York Virtuoso Singers

Volti

Syracuse Children's Chorus

2006 the Esoterics

Opus 7

Youth Choral Theater of Chicago

2005 VocalEssence

Volti

Young People's Chorus of New York City

2004 Opus 7

San Francisco Girls Chorus

South Bend Chamber Singers

2003 Los Angeles Master Chorale

The Esoterics

Peninsula Women's Chorus

Portland Symphonic Girlchoir

2002 VocalEssence

The San Francisco Chamber Singers

Opus 7

Syracuse Children's Chorus

2001 the Choral Arts Society of Washington

The Esoterics

Los Angeles Chamber Singers and Cappella

Glen Ellyn Children's Chorus

2000 San Francisco Girls Chorus

Kansas City Chorale

Cantori di New York

The Phoenix Bach Choir is regarded as one of the finest professional choirs in America and is rapidly increasing in national and international fame. Both international and national critics recognize that the Choir's musical offerings educate, entertain and inspire audiences. The Choir is dedicated to performing sensitive and informed presentations of traditional masterworks, as well as recording, performing, and commissioning new music. It has been featured at regional choral conventions, in Salt Lake City, Honolulu, Indianapolis and Houston. It has performed for the Governor of Arizona and the Arch-Bishop Emeritus of South Africa, Desmond Tutu. In March, 2003, as part of the Other Minds 9 festival of new music, it performed a West Coast premiere of Cafe Desire by Daniel Lentz in San Francisco before a capacity crowd.

In 2004, the Phoenix Bach Choir became the first North American Choir with an album produced by Chandos, the largest independent classical record label, with their Shakespeare in Song CD. They have produced two more, in 2006 and 2007, with this label, along with the Kansas City Chorale. They have treated audiences around the country to sounds of music on National Public Radio's Performance Today, and on other NPR-affiliated stations around the globe including BBC Radio 3 and ABC radio in Australia.

The sound on Chandos' hybrid SACD and the engineering has been graded as first-rate, though the sound on the stereo is not inferior to the SACD. The two choirs are recording for Chandos because the label can give them the highest production values. The Phoenix Bach Choir plans to have a new release by Gretchaninov some time soon.

Conductor Charles Bruffy has made a name for himself in American choral circles over the last twenty years. He leads the 24-member choir in performing new music as well as traditional masterworks. The choir performs at schools in and around the Phoenix area, in addition to performing, recording and touring around the country, displaying its Bach to School outreach program, for which it has been nominated for Chorus America's best education outreach program.

The combined choirs of the Phoenix Bach Choir and the Kansas City Chorale, both led by Bruffy, are so skilled that their tone has body even with the softest dynamics. Some believe that since the Dale Warland Singers, there has not been a choir to measure up to the very close blend, balance and intonation, which is right on key and cue.

In the Phoenix Bach Choir and the Kansas City Chorale's Eternal Rest CD, they perform Jaakko M. ntyj rvi's Canticum Calamitatis Maritimae, composed in 1997, Frank Ticheli's There Will be Rest, created in 2000, and Frank Martin's Mass for Double Choir, composed in 1922 and revised in 1926, as well as Rene Clausen's in Pace from 1997.

Very few choirs or singers have been able to raise themselves up to the level of professional from an amateur standing. There are a few outstanding songstresses, including Kate Schrock, who has been building an audience with a "do-it-yourself" attitude. On her own label, Kakelane Music, Kate has released five critically acclaimed albums: Refuge in 1994, Shunyata in 1997, Dames Rocket in 2000, and Live from the Majestic and Indiana in 2003. Her songs have joined with others in compilation CDs and on movie soundtracks, including the 1999 release of MGM's Carrie II: The Rage. Billboard's 'Talent Net" said Kate Schrock was one of the best new artists in the year 2000.

Arts Organizations such as Freetown Village have won the hearts of supporters locally and regionally, on their upward climb from amateur to professional. This group began presenting performances in the Madam Walker Theatre Center in Indianapolis, Indiana as part of the initiative to retain tourism in the Indiana Avenue Cultural District. Performances tell the story of Madame C.J. Walker, "the first African-American female self-made millionaire," and the Indiana Avenue Cultural District. The Madam Walker Theatre Center partners with Freetown Village in hosting performances in the Heritage Center. The group's performances are sponsored through a grant from the Indianapolis Cultural Development Commission and the Arts Council of Indianapolis. The commission's goal is to strengthen Indianapolis as a destination for cultural entertainment. Ophelia Wellington, Founding Director of Freetown Village, says this project will fulfill their goals on Indiana Avenue of providing regularly scheduled cultural programming.

Another group which has made it up from the ranks is the Chicago Symphony Chorus (CSO). They call themselves the first professional symphony chorus, having won 9 Grammys since 1957, when it was founded by Margaret Hillis and conductor Fritz Reiner of the Chicago Symphony. With 200 members, the chorus performs with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. Their work spans pieces from the great choral and orchestral works by Verdi, Beethoven, Bach and Brahms (German Requiem). Along with the Lyric Opera in Chicago, they performed Miserere, a premiere performance of Henryk Gorecki's work, led by Duain Wolfe. Over half the singers are professional.