We are pleased to announce Season 31. The rest of our site reflects our 30th Anniversary Season which has just concluded, but here are the concerts for our next season. Check back later when our site will be updated for the entire season. Thanks for your interest and support.
See the Home Page link for information about auditons.
Saturday, October 25, 7:30 pm;
Shirley Recital Hall, Salem Fine Arts Center
Magnificent Magnificats
We open the season with an evening devoted to multiple musical responses to those stirring words of Mary from Luke 1 that begin “My soul doth magnify the Lord.” They will be heard in English, Latin and German in a striking array of musical idioms, ranging from those of Johann Pachelbel and Dietrich Buxtehude in the 17th century, the warm romantic sounds of Felix Mendelssohn in the 19th century, the fiery reactions of Herbert Howells and Bryan Kelly (his with a Latin American twist) in the latter half of the last century, and Canadian Ruth Watson Henderson in the early years of the present century. Assisting artists: organist Donald Armitage, and Baroque violinists John Pruett and Susan Perkins.
Friday, December 5, 7:30 pm and Saturday, December 6, 3:00 pm; St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church
Festival of Carols
We offer you a very special festival this time around, since our guest artists will be the Winston-Salem Children’s Chorus, Barbara C. Beattie, artistic director. The performance will open with a group of Renaissance motets, followed by colorful arrangements of traditional carols from the pens of Stephen Chatman, Bob Chilcott and Howard Helvey, all sung by PCS. The WSCC will present its own group of seasonal music, and then both ensembles will combine for the first performance of William Stevens’ Four Christmas Songs, newly arranged for a combination of young and adult voices.
Sunday, December 14, 6:00 and 7:00 pm;
Bethabara Geminhaus
Candlelight Christmas
This longstanding tradition, our gift to the community, will feature a new twist this year, since it will open with some of the familiar Alfred Burt carols, alternating with lovely settings of some of the Burt family lyrics set to music by Abbie Betinis, a young Minneapolis-based composer and grand-daughter of Alfred Burt, who in recent years has been writing a new carol each season for presentation on Minnesota Public Radio. Other seasonal music, old and new will alternate with communal singing and solo organ pieces by guest organist Tony Robertson.
Saturday, February 21, 7:30 pm;
Hanes Auditorium, Salem Fine Arts Center
King David
The centerpiece of the evening will be Arthur Honegger’s dramatic King David, written in 1921. Originally a staged theater piece, the narrative is told in English translation by the chorus, fifteen members of the Carolina Chamber Symphony, three vocal soloists, a speaking Witch of Endor, and a narrator. The Honegger will be preceded by Erick Whiteacre’s Five Hebrew Love Songs, striking pieces written on poems by the young composer’s wife for chorus, solo violin and piano. The evening will open with a setting by a young Leonard Bernstein for chorus and organ of the Jewish evening prayer, Haskivenu.
Saturday, April 25, 7:30 pm;
St. Timothy’s Episcopal Church
Partners in Song: a joint concert with
the Bel Canto Company
For the second time in their histories the two groups will combine for a concert that will be repeated in Greensboro on April 27. For its separate part of the evening PCS will present Aaron Copland’s Las Agachadas and the Italian-American Mario Castelnuovo-Tedesco’s vibrant Romancero Gitano: Seven Poems of Federico Garcia Lorca with guitarist Joseph Pecoraro, a member of the NCSA faculty. Bel Canto will sing works by Claudio Monteverdi, Ivan Hrusovsky, Trond Kaverno and Eric Whiteacre. The pieces to be sung jointly include two for double choir by Mendelssohn and Norman Dello Joio’s Song of the Open Road with trumpeter Anita Cirba.