The University of Montevallo Concert Choir will perform at the historic Carnegie Hall in New York on Feb. 16 at 8 p.m. for the 2019 Gotham SINGS! Choral Festival and Ensemble Showcase.
Festival organizers, Sechrist Travel, selected the UM Concert Choir to perform based on their international choral performances. “We carefully select and invite only top choral programs,” said Sean Berg, Sechrist Travel’s executive director. “These choirs are selected for their stellar reputations and exemplary work on the national and international level and the unprecedented choral music education opportunities and performances offered at each institution.”
Dr. Melinda Doyle
Under the director of Dr. Melinda Doyle, associate professor of music, the concert choir is the premier choral ensemble at the University of Montevallo. “To be selected to perform as featured ensemble at such a beloved and historic musical venue is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity for our students. It is my goal to be able to provide such experiences, so our students gain greater appreciation for the choral art form,” said Doyle.
The concert opens with the Philadelphia Boys Choir & Chorale followed by the University of Montevallo Concert Choir featuring faculty soloist Dr. Roderick George, tenor. The concert, then, culminates with a commemoration of the centennial of the WWI armistice and Celebration of Peace, featuring the Gotham SINGS! Festival Chorus and Orchestra in a performance of Ralph Vaughan Williams’s “Dona Nobis Pacem.”
Dr. Roderick George
“Performing on the Carnegie Hall stage is an amazing opportunity for our students and it will likely be one of those enriching experiences that they will cherish for years to come,” said George.
In addition to the Carnegie Hall performance, the choir is slated to make appearances at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in New York City and Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, D.C.
For more information and tickets for the Carnegie performance, visit carnegiehall.org
ABOUT the UM Concert Choir:
The Concert Choir is the premier choral ensemble at the University of Montevallo and is among the most highly regarded choirs in the southeast. Under the direction of Dr. Melinda Doyle, this auditioned ensemble, comprised primarily of music majors, performs a diverse repertoire ranging from choral masterworks to spiritual arrangements. The choir tours annually and has made appearances throughout Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and Tennessee, and has performed featured concerts for the American Choral Directors Association and the Alabama Music Educators Association Conference.
Internationally, the choir has performed in some of the world’s best-known musical venues on their inaugural 2015 Invitational European Performance Tour of the Czech Republic, Hungary and Austria. In summer 2018, the choir embarked on their second international invitational tour to the United Kingdom and France and performed at such venues as King’s College in Cambridge, Canterbury Cathedral and the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris.
The choir has also performed several major works with the Alabama Symphony Orchestra, including recent performances of Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony” and Orff’s “Carmina Burana.” In addition to concerts on campus each semester, the Concert Choir is frequently featured in concerts throughout the Birmingham, Alabama area and presents the annual “A Montevallo Choral Christmas” at the Lucille Ryals Thompson Colonial Chapel at the American Village in December. The choir has recently recorded new manuscripts for Hinshaw Music, an international choral music publishing company.
