Al Schmidt Concert

The Al Schmidt Concert Series Presents:

This performance is named in honor of the late Alfred R. Schmidt, who

served on the Rose-Hulman mathematics faculty for 46 years. An
accomplished musician, he accompanied the Rose Glee Club and served as
its adviser for 25 years, and played the organ at every commencement from
1959 until his retirement in 1995.

Called the worlds reigning male chorus by The New Yorker magazine, the GRAMMY
award winning ensemble Chanticleer embarks upon its 39th season in 2016-17. Chanticleer
performs over 100 concerts in the U.S. and around the world annually. The Boston Globe said of
Chanticleer (Their singing) is breathtaking in its accuracy of intonation, purity of blend, variety
of color and swagger of style. Chanticleer based in San Francisco is known around the world
as an orchestra of voices for the seamless blend of its twelve male voices ranging from
countertenor to bass and its original interpretations of vocal literature, from Renaissance to jazz,
and from gospel to venturesome new music.

Schmidts generous support provided Hatfield Hall with a Renaissance R-380

digital organ. One of the most technically advanced pipeless organs, it
features the worlds first programmable stop list, SoundMatrix technology and
Virtual Acoustics features ranging from pipe chamber to cathedral sounds.

Under the direction of Music Director William Fred Scott, Chanticleer will perform this season in
52 cities in 22 of the United States, with 26 performances in the San Francisco Bay Area, its
home. A winter tour of Europe will feature returns to a number of Europe's great concert halls
such as Vienna's Musikverein, Pragues Rudolfinum, Budapest's Lizst Academy, and Dublin's
National Theater, as well as a debut in Berlin's Konzerthaus. Other cities included in the tour are
Paris, St. Petersburg, Pcs, Veszprm, Szeged, Somborn, Siegen, Friedrichshafen and Dachau.

The White Chapels organ, and its Steinway grand piano, were also donated
by Schmidt

The 16-17 season in the Bay Area features a return collaboration with Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg
and the New Century Chamber Orchestra in a program called Americans in Paris. My Secret
Heart, which includes a new commission by Finnish composer Jaako Mantyjrvi, opens the Bay
Area season in September and A Chanticleer Christmas will have its usual 23 performances
across the United States as well as the Bay Area, and will be broadcast by American Public
Media, and a new program of sacred music, Psalm, featuring Pulitzer prize winner John
Harbison's first work for the ensemble, will premiere in June.
With the help of individual contributions, foundation and corporate support, the Ensemble
involves over 5,000 young people each year. The Louis A. Botto (LAB) Choiran after school
honors program for high school and college studentsis now in its fifth year, adding to the
ongoing program of in-school clinics and workshops, Chanticleer Youth Choral Festivals in the
Bay Area and around the country, master classes for university students nationwide, and the
biannual Chanticleer in Sonoma summer workshop for adult choral singers. The Singing Life
a documentary about Chanticleers work with young peoplewas released in 2008. In 2010,
Chanticleers education program was recognized by the Chorus America Education Outreach
Award.
Since Chanticleer began releasing recordings in 1981, the group has sold well over a million and
won two GRAMMY awards. Chanticleers recordings are distributed by Chanticleer, Naxos,
Rhino Records, Arkiv, and iTunes among others, and are available on Chanticleers website,
www.chanticleer.org.
Chanticleers long-standing commitment to commissioning and performing new works was
honored in 2008 by the inaugural Dale Warland/Chorus America Commissioning Award
and the ASCAP/Chorus America Award for Adventurous Programming. Among the over
eighty composers commissioned in Chanticleers history are Mark Adamo, Mason Bates, Rgis
Campo, Chen Yi, David Conte, Shawn Crouch, Douglas J. Cuomo, Brent Michael Davids, Anthony
Davis, Gabriela Lena Frank, Guido Lpez-Gaviln, Stacy Garrop, John Harbison, William Hawley,
Jake Heggie, Jackson Hill, Kamran Ince, Jeeyoung Kim, Tania Len, Jaakko Mntyjrvi, Michael
McGlynn, Peter Michaelides, John Musto, Tarik ORegan, Roxanna Panufnik, Stephen Paulus,
Shulamit Ran, Bernard Rands, Steven Sametz, Carlos Sanchez-Guttierez, Jan Sandstrm, Paul
Schoenfield, Steven Stucky, John Tavener, Augusta Read Thomas and Janike Vandervelde.
In 2014 Chorus America conferred the inaugural Brazeal Wayne Dennard Award on Chanticleers
Music Director Emeritus Joseph H. Jennings to acknowledge his contribution to the African
American choral tradition during this 25 year (l983-2009) tenure as a singer and music director
with Chanticleer. The hundred plus arrangements of African American gospel, spiritual and jazz
made by Jennings for Chanticleer have been given thousands of performances worldwide live
and on broadcast, and recorded for Warner Classics and Chanticleer Records. Jennings retired
from Chanticleer in 2009; his gospel and spiritual arrangements continue to be a signature part
of Chanticleers repertoire.
Named for the clear-singing rooster in Geoffrey Chaucers Canterbury Tales, Chanticleer was
founded in 1978 by tenor Louis A. Botto, who sang in the Ensemble until 1989 and served as
Artistic Director until his death in 1997. Chanticleer was named Ensemble of the Year by

Musical America in 2008, and installed in the American Classical Music Hall of Fame the same
year.

Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair*

Chanticleera 501(c)(3) non-profit corporationis the recipient of major grants from the
Amphion Foundation, the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation, The William & Flora Hewlett
Foundation, The Dunard Fund/USA, The Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation through USArtists
International in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts and the Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation, The Bernard Osher Foundation, the Osher Pro Suecia Foundation, The Bob Ross
Foundation, Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund, and The National Endowment for
the Arts.

This Marriage

Whitacre

-- INTERMISSION

CHANTICLEER
MY SECRET HEART

V.

Cortez Mitchell, Gerrod Pagenkopf, Kory Reid,

Alan Reinhardt, Logan Shields, Adam Ward soprano and alto
Chris Albanese, Brian Hinman, Andrew Van Allsburg tenor
Eric Alatorre, Matthew Knickman, Marques Jerrell Ruff baritone and bass
William Fred Scott, Music Director

My Blood is Blazing With Desire

Behold, darkness has fallen
Vocalise

VI.

Sebastin de Vivanco (1551 - 1622)

Jehan LHritier (c. 1480 - 1551)
Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525 - 1594)
Jacobus Clemens non Papa (c. 1510 - c. 1556)
Francisco Guerrero (1528 - 1599)

II.
Poetry by Pierre de Ronsard (1524 1585)
Bonjour mon coeur
Ce ris plus doux
Le premier jour du mois de May, Madame

Philippe de Monte (1521 - 1603)

Anthoine de Bertrand (c. 1540 - 1581)
de Monte

III.
Poetry by Edith Sdergran (1892 - 1923)
Jaakko Mntyjrvi (b. 1963)
Commissioned by Chanticleer, 2016
with the support of the Osher Pro Suecia Foundation

Love Songs*
(b. 1964)

Augusta Read Thomas

II.
III.
V.
VI.
VII.

Look out upon the stars, my love

Love is a beautiful dream.
Alas, the love of women! It is known to be a lovely and a fearful thing.
For stony limits cannot hold love out.
All mankind love a lover.
Commissioned for Chanticleer, 1997
by Cathy Nicho (for her husband, Raul), Dianne Nolting (for her husband, George Wolter),
Bert Dieringer (for his wife, Janna Blanchard), Peter Henschel (for his wife, Kathy), Ron
Barrington (for his wife, Christine), Marshall Rutter (for his wife, Terry Knowles), and an
anonymous commissioner.
VII.
A selection of popular songs to be selected from

Ill Follow My Secret Heart

Hommage Edith

It was a lover and his lass

Les Chemins de lAmour

Nol Coward (1899 - 1973)

arr. Adam Ward
Solo: Andrew Van Allsburg
John Rutter (b. 1945)
Francis Poulenc (1899 - 1963)
arr. Evan Price

La Vie en Rose

IV.
Go, lovely rose
Ah! May the Red Rose Live Alway!

Mikhail Glinka (1804 - 1857)

Sergey Taneyev (1856 - 1915)
Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873 - 1943)
arr. Elger Niels
Solo: Cortez Mitchell

I.
I am the Rose of Sharon
Poetry from the Song of Songs
Veni, dilecte mi*
Nigra sum
Osculetur me
Ego flos campi (a 3)
Surge, propera amica mea

Foster, arr. Gene Puerling

Solo: Brian Hinman

dith Piaf (1915 - 1963), arr. Price

Solo: Kory Reid

Eric Whitacre (b. 1970)

Stephen Foster (1826 - 1864)
arr. John Musto

Love Walked In*

George Gershwin (1898 - 1937)

arr. Puerling

Frankie and Johnny

Trad. American Song

arr. Robert De Cormier

Somebody to Love*

Website www.chanticleer.org

Freddie Mercury (1946 - 1991)

arr. Vince Peterson

- Program subject to change * These works have been recorded by Chanticleer, and are available at tonights performance
or through our digital storefront at www.chanticleer.org\

Chanticleer is a non-profit organization, governed by a volunteer Board of Trustees,

administered by a professional staff with a full-time professional ensemble. In
addition to the many individual contributors to Chanticleer, the Board of Trustees
thanks the following Foundations, Corporations and Government Agencies for their
exceptional support:
The National Endowment for the Arts Grants for the Arts/San Francisco Hotel Tax
Fund
The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation Dunard Fund USA The Ann and
Gordon Getty Foundation
The Bernard Osher Foundation The Bob Ross Foundation
The Wallis Foundation The Carol Franc Buck Foundation
Chanticleer Staff
Christine Bullin, President & General Director
Tiffany Lucas, Chief Development Officer
Curt Hancock, Director of Operations and Touring
Brian Bauman, Senior Accountant/Budget Manager
Joe Ledbetter, Marketing/Development & IT Systems Manager
Barbara Bock, Development and Marketing Associate
Ben Johns, Director of LAB Choir
Toran Davenport, LAB Choir Manager and Intern
William Fred Scott, Music Director
Kory Reid, Assistant Music Director
Brian Hinman, Road Manager
Matthew Knickman, Merchandise Manager
Marques Jerrell Ruff, Andrew Van Allsburg, Merchandise Associates
Artist Management: Opus 3 Artists, Ltd.
Label Manager: Lisa Nauful
Founder: Louis Botto (1951 1997)
Music Director Emeritus: Joseph H. Jennings

Program notes by Kory Reid, William Fred Scott, Jace Wittig, Gregory Peebles, and Elena Sharkova

Veni, dilecte mi Sebastin de Vivanco (1551-1622)

The walled city of vila, in the Spanish province of Castila-Leon, gave rise to three
pivotal Renaissance figures: composers Toms Luis de Victoria, Sebastin de
Vivanco, and the Spanish mystic Teresa of vila. Separated in age by only three
years, Victoria and Vivanco undoubtedly received their earliest musical training from
the same teachers. But unlike Victoria, whose career flourished in Rome, Vivanco
remained in Spain throughout his life. After tenures at the cathedrals of Lrida and
Segovia, he was invited to become Francisco Guerreros assistant in Seville in 1587.
He went so far as to visit the aging master in Seville, but instead accepted the
maestro de capilla position at vila Cathedral. In 1602, Vivanco was appointed to a
similar post in Salamanca; he left after less than a year to pursue a professorship at
the University of Salamanca, the oldest university in Spain. It was through his
connections there that he was able to publish three lavish volumes of his works.
Although his music is virtually unknown today, Vivanco was one of the leading
composers of his time a master of counterpoint who imbued his works with deep
emotional sentiment.
Veni, dilecte mi is scored for eight voices in two four-voice choirs, and is included in
a volume of motets the composer dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary. Here, he
employs a text from the Song of Songs, a book of the Bible closely associated with
the Spanish mystics. This then-controversial sect, led by Teresa of vila, reimagined
the quasi-erotic poetry present in the Song of Songs as a metaphor for the Churchs
role as the Bride of Christ. Vivancos setting gives light to this mystical rapture
through lush suspensions and sharply contrasting harmonies between the choirs.
Veni, dilecte mi, egrediamur in agro,
commoremur in villis.
Mane surgamus ad vineas;
videamus si floruit vinea,
si flores fructus parturiunt,
their fruit,
si floruerunt mala punica;
ibi dabo tibi ubera mea.
Mandragor dederunt odorem suum,
in portis nostris omnia poma,
nova et vetera, dilecte mi,
servavi tibi.

Come, my beloved, let us go out into the countryside,

let us lodge in the villages.
Let us go up to the vineyards at first light;
let us see if the vines are blooming,
if the flowers are bringing forth
if the pomegranates are in blossom.
There I will give you my breasts.
The mandrakes give forth their fragrance;
at our gates are all manner of fruits new and old which, my beloved,
I have offered up to you.

Nigra sum Jehan LHritier (c. 1480 - 1551)

Osculetur me Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina (1525 - 1594)
Music may have been the family profession for Jehan LHritier. While that
statement means little in comparison, say, to the Bachs or even the Couperins (to say
nothing of the more modern Trapp Family Singers or even the Jackson Five), at least
three members of the LHritier family were practicing musicians. And of these
three, only Jehan has achieved any notoriety at allan acclaim seldom reaching
beyond those singers and scholars who are eager to bring to light lesser known
Renaissance music. There seem to be, in Jehans limited output, only two secular
madrigals (in what would surely be called the Italian style) and not even a single full
setting of the Mass itself. Hardly anything exists other than his four dozen religious
motets.
So what is it that inspired Palestrina to base one of his Mass settings on this earlier
motet by LHritier? Since LHritier had a connection at the Vatican (records
indicate that he was for a time employed as a musician there), he may have met the
young Palestrina. Palestrina may even have heard the choir singing any of a number
of motets by the elusive Frenchman, born around 1480 and still setting quill to
parchment in the mid-1550s. As other program annotators have quickly discovered,
LHritiers music must speak for itself, given the paucity of biographical detail
which has survived into the present day. What is unmistakable is that this music
speaks with a personal voice at once elegant and profound. Jehan LHritier joins
the more exuberant traditions of a Josquin (who may have once been Jehans teacher)
with the more sober and cultivated work of a Palestrina and thus validates his
relevance as a transitional figure between the old styles and the new.
Few lines from the Biblical Song of Songs have been as cherished by composers
from the Middle Ages onward as have those of Nigra sum. Here there lies a clear
parallel between the humble handmaiden of the Lord, as the Virgin Mary describes
herself, and the black but comely daughter of Jerusalem, whose beauty leads the
King himself to invite her in. LHritier writes for a five-voice choir in this version,
which seems to be one of three settings of the same text from his hand. There is a
quiet exaltation to the way the lines rise and fall. Even more vivid is the slight
frisson of delight with which the youthful girl describes herself as beautiful
(formosa). The music alternates between passages of simple melisma -- voices
tumbling over one another in humble joy -- and austere, inexorable, block chords.
This culminates at the moment in which the King seems to take her by the hand and
walk, step by step, into his most private chamber (et introduxit me in cubiculum
suum). After the melodic undulations subside, there is a simple tread to the music.
Perhaps there is a hint of hesitation, of blessed hush, as she imagines what her next
steps will bring. Could that other comely daughter of Jerusalem have felt the same
way when she received her unearthly and amazing news?
Nigra sum sed formosa, fili
ideo dilexit me Rex,
et introduxit me in cubiculum suum.

Jerusalem, I am black but beautiful, oh daughters of Jerusalem,

Therefore the King has delighted in me,
And he has brought me into his chamber.

Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina was born in the town from which he took his name.
He was Maestro di Cappella at St. Peters in Rome from 1551-1554 and again from
1571 until his death in 1594. At a moment in musical history in which the church
fathers began to decry too much description (ornamentation) and flair (harmonic
invention), Palestrina stuck to a musical style based in seriousness and sobriety. His
strict style of Renaissance counterpoint has been held up as a pedagogical model
by students of nearly every succeeding generation. Palestrina achieved a mastery of
contrapuntal techniques, meticulous voice leading, and refined treatment of
dissonance now universally idealized as the Palestrina style. This is not to say that
Palestrinas music is inexpressive or occasionally daring. In fact, there is a personal
and deeply emotional core to all of his sacred works. He wrote in the prima prattica
style, codified by the treatises of Zarlino, which prioritized the polyphonic form and
structure over text.
The text of Osculetur me, which sounds quite secular in nature, comes from Song of
Songs 1:1-2. The metaphor of two lovers (or a bride and a groom) is used to describe
the relationship between the love and blessings of Jesus Christ and the offerings that
come from the faithful people of the Church. The polyphony is simple, restrained,
and free from ornamental figures. It was most likely intended as vocal chamber
music, in which the performing forces would consist of one to two on a single vocal
line. Such motets were often sung inside or outside for small devotional services,
social gatherings, or festival celebrations of the day.
Osculetur me osculo oris sui,
quia meliora sunt ubera tua vino,
fragrantia unguentis optimis
ointments.
Oleum effusum nomen tuum,
ideo adulescentulae dilexerunt te.

Let him kiss me with the kiss of his mouth:

for your breasts are better than wine,
more fragrant than the best
Your name is as oil poured out:
therefore the young have loved you.

Ego flos campi (a 3) Jacobus Clemens non Papa (c. 1510 c. 1556)
Jacobus Clemens non Papa (so called to distinguish him from Pope Clemens VII and
the poet Jacobus Papa, both of whom were his contemporaries) was one of the most
prolific composers of the early sixteenth century. Born in the Netherlands, he was
especially at home in the idiom of the motet. His writing shows an advanced use of
harmonic language as well as an expressiveness of melody directly related to the
text.
The text of Ego flos campi is found in the second chapter of Song of Songs (2:1-3.)
The poetry is especially fascinating because of its amalgam of ideas, thoughts, and
metaphors from both the sacred and the profane. It is no accident that Clemens non
Papa composed this piece for three voices; one can assume that this pays homage to

the Trinity and also allows the chords to remain simple and clean. The
compositional style of Ego flos campi is very much in the prima prattica style,
employing pervasive imitation throughout the piece and a steady flowing groove that
accentuates the text.
Ego flos campi et lilium convallium.
Sicut lilium inter spinas,
sic amica mea inter filias.
Sicut malus inter ligna silvarum,
sic dilectus meus inter filios.

I am the flower of the field and the lily of the valley.

As the lily among thorns,
so is my love among the daughters.
As the apple tree among the trees in the woods,
so is my beloved among the sons.

Surge, propera amica mea Francisco Guerrero (1528 - 1599)

Although his music is often neglected today, Francisco Guerrero was second in
importance only to Victoria during the Spanish Renaissance. A student of Cristbal
de Morales, Guerrero served as chapelmaster at the Seville Cathedral. Unlike
Victoria and Morales, Guerrero was also a prolific composer of secular songs, many
of which he later re-set with sacred texts (a common practice of the time). The effort
and money he dedicated to publishing his music garnered him a certain degree of
fame during his lifetime--as far away as South America. His music remained widely
performed in the cathedrals of Spain and New Spain for more than two hundred
years after his death. Recent years have seen a resurgence of interest in Guerreros
work. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Guerrero spent the majority of his time in
Spain and traveled to Italy only briefly. Perhaps because of this, his music is often
said to sound quintessentially Spanish when compared to Victoria or Morales, and he
set many Spanish texts (as opposed to Victoria, who wrote exclusively in Latin).
Surge, propera amica mea is a six-part motet, divided into two sections. The second
soprano line serves as the cantus firmus in the piece, singing Veni, sponsa Christi
(Come, Bride of Christ), which anchors the harmony and weaves a sacred thread
into the secular story sung by the other vocal parts. This cantus firmus descends by a
step each time it is sung in the prima pars, eventually hitting the fourth below the
tonic. In the secunda pars, that same lower fourth begins the movement and ascends
back to the starting note of the piece. This chant serves not only as a rising/falling
textual tool for Guerreros idea of flight, but also illustrates how ingeniously he
tips his hat to the past, utilizing sacred chant as a foundation for his composition.
Surge, propera amica mea,
columba mea, formosa mea, et veni.
Iam enim hiems transit,
imber abiit et recessit.
Flores apparuerunt in terra nostra,
tempus putationis advenit.
Vox turturis audita est in terra nostra;
ficus protulit grossos suos;
vineae florentes dederunt odorem suum
Surge, propera amica mea,
speciosa mea, et veni.

Rise up, my love,

my dove, my fair one, and come.
For now, the winter has passed,
the rain is over and gone.
Flowers appear on the earth,
the time of pruning is at hand.
The voice of the turtle dove is heard in our land;
the fig tree puts forth its green figs;
.the vines with their blooms give forth a good smell.
Rise up, my love,
my beautiful, and come.

Bonjour mon coeur Philippe de Monte (1521 - 1603)

Le premier jour du mois de May, Madame de Monte
The impact of Pierre de Ronsard on the literary scene of Western Europe is hard to
overlook, although not much of Ronsard is read, or taught, any more. Known even
in his own time as the Prince of Poets, he was the chief among the French
Renaissance group of poets known as La Pliade. Ronsard was a true son of
France, although his studies and the occasional work assignment, took him away
from his native country on several occasions. Born in a family manor in the
Vendme region, he died there sixty-one years later, honored by kings, decorated
with honors and feted throughout Europe.
In a striking coincidence, Ronsard, Montaigne, Cervantes and Shakespeare are
practically contemporaries: all four of these trail-blazing writers were born in the
first part of the sixteenth century. In fact, Shakespeare and Cervantes both died in
the same year, 1616. What Cervantes created in the picaresque novel, Shakespeare
did in his great dramas. (Don Quixote and Falstaff are not that far apart, perhaps.)
Shakespeares love poetry, especially as found in the Sonnets, may be every bit as
deep as Ronsards, but Ronsard is frequently the more bawdy and overstated of the
two. And the great essays of Montaigne stand in a niche all by themselves. No one
before or since has excelled in that vein to nearly that extent.
Three of Ronsards more clever poems are set here by composers whose names are
almost forgotten. Cross-pollination between English madrigals and French chanson,
however, is hard to miss. There is a certain Morley-esque verve in Philippe de
Montes setting of Le premier jour de May, Madame. The Month of Maying holds
court on both sides of the English Channel, it would seem!
Philippe de Monte was a prolific writer in small forms. It has been said that he wrote
more madrigals than any other composer of his time, although publishing being what
it was in those days, such a statement is difficult to verify. That he was peripatetic
can hardly be doubted: born in Flanders, he studied in Italy (not surprising in his
time), worked in England, composed in France, took a post in the court of the
Hapsburg Maximilian II, and died in Prague. There are over 1100 madrigals to his
credit, as well as some forty settings of the Mass, and over two hundred sacred
motets.
Bonjour mon Coeur is one of Ronsards most frequently used poems. The poem
delights in a certain coyness: is the speaker apologizing to his mistress for having
left her for a time, or is he bragging that his nearness to the King has made him more
desirable than ever? In the same way that Shakespeare claims never say that
absence seemed my flame to qualify, here the speaker says I would rather die than
have you say that my affections were as ice-cold as a rock. I had to follow the king.
De Montes cadences assure us of a happy ending, as do Ronsards words, Let

riches, position and honor perish. I would give them up anyway, for you, my sweet
and beautiful goddess.
Bonjour mon coeur, bonjour ma douce vie
Bonjour mon oeil, bonjour ma chre amie!
H! Bonjour ma toute belle,
Ma mignardise, bonjour
Mes dlices, mon amour,
Mon doux printemps, ma douce fleur nouvelle,
Mon doux plaisir, ma douce colombelle,
Mon passereau, ma gente tourterelle!
Bonjour ma douce rebelle.
Je veux mourir si plus on me reproche,
que mon service est plus froid quune roche.
De t'avoir laisse, matresse,
Pour aller suivre le Roi,
Mendiant je ne sais quoi,
Que le vulgaire appelle une largesse,
Plutt prisse honneur, court et richesse,
Que pour les biens jamais je te relaisse,
Ma douce et belle desse.

Greetings my heart, greetings my sweet life,

Greetings my eye, greetings my dear beloved,
Ah! Greetings my all-lovely,
My tasty morsel, hello
My delight, my love,
My sweet spring, my sweet young flower,
My sweet pleasure, my sweet pigeon,
My sparrow, my gentle dove!
Greetings, my sweet rebel.
Id rather die if people still reproach me
That my service is colder than a stone.
I had to leave you, mistress,
To follow the King,
Begging for something,
Which the common folk call a hand-out.
Let honor, position and riches perish,
I would give them up anyway for you,
My sweet and beautiful goddess.

Le premier jour du mois de May, Madame de Monte

Le premier jour du mois de May,
Dedans le coeur je sentis vos beaux yeux,
Bruns, doux, courtois, riants, delicieux
Qui d'un glaon feraient natre une flamme,
De leur beau jour le souvenir m'enflamme,
Et par penser j'en deviens amoureux.
O de mon coeur les meurtriers bienheureux,
Votre vertu je sens jusques en l'me,
Yeux qui tenez la clef de mon penser,
Matres de moi qui ptes offenser,
D'un seul regard ma raison toute mue,
reason
Ah! Que je suis de votre amour point,
Las je devais, vais jour de votre vue
Plus longuement ou bien ne vous voir point.

Madame,
On the first day of May, my lady,
Within my heart I felt your lovely eyes,
Brown, sweet, courteous, laughing, delicious,
Which with a glance started a fire.
The memory of their lovely light burns me
And in thinking of it Ive fallen in love with them,
Those sweet murderers of my heart!
I feel your worth down in my soul;
Those eyes which hold the key to my thoughts,
My masters, who can with a single look
Overwhelm my deeply-affected
Oh! How I am stabbed by love for you.
Alas! I must enjoy the sight of you
For longer, or else see you

no more.

Ce ris plus doux Anthoine de Bertrand (c. 1540 - 1581)

The work of Anthoine (sometimes, Antoine) de Bertrand is much less known than
that of Philippe (sometimes, Filippo) de Monte. He is believed to have been born in
Fontanges, in the Auvergne region of France, in 1540, although some records
indicate an earlier birthdate of 1530. Like de Monte and others, he was influenced by
the Italian madrigals of his time. There is a unity and compactness to his work,
which makes its greatest effect with short-lined melismatic passages, off-the-beat
syncopations and delicate word-painting.

Bertrand was quite taken with the poetry of Ronsard. He seems to have positioned
himself as a member of the inner circle of the city of Toulouse, where he
surrounded himself with other poets and composers, political figures and painters
who reveled in the poetic genius of their Parisian colleague. Bertrands first book of
chansons based on poetry of Ronsard, Premier Livre des Amours de P. de Ronsard,
1578, was dedicated to the Bourbon Charles III. Although Bertrand himself
suggested, in the dedication, that this would be the first of several such collections,
only two seemed to have been published.
Ce ris plus doux is a sweet piece, as its title might imply. The poet/lover delineates
the beauty of his sweetheart. The smile is sweeter than a bees honey, the teeth are
a double-row of diamonds, the lips are crimson, the voice would waken even the
dead. The voices of Ronsard and de Bertrand are seductive, not death-defying.
Only once does the music escape the bounds of decorum, as the poet suggests that
the enchantment of her sweet voice makes even the woods jump for joy.
Ce ris plus doux que luvre dune abeille,
Ces doubles lis doublement argents,
Ces diamants double rang plants
Dans le corail de sa bouche vermeille,
Ce doux parler qui les mourants veille,
Ce chant qui tient mes soucis enchants
Et ces deux cieux sur deux astres ents,
De ma desse annoncent la merveille.
Du beau jardin de son printemps riant
Nat un parfum qui mme lOrient
Embaumerat de ses douces haleines.
Et de l sort le charme dune voix
Qui tout ravis fait sauteler les bois
Planer les monts et montagner les plaines.

This smile, sweeter than a bees honey

These teeth like two silvery ramparts,
These diamonds planted in double rows
In the coral of her crimson lips,
This sweet speech which re-awakens souls,
This song which holds my fears enchanted
And these two heavens above two stars,
Announce the miracle which is my Goddess.
From the beautiful garden of her youthful springtime
Is born a perfume, which heaven at all times
Would perfume with its sweet breath.
And from thence issues the magic of a voice
Which makes the woods, completely charmed, jump for joy
Flattens mountains and raises up the plains.

Hommage Edith Jaakko Mntyjrvi (b. 1963)

Jaakko Mntyjrvi is a Finnish translator and composer. A professional freelance
translator, he is also an active semi-professional musician involved mostly in choral
singing. Consequently, most of his output as a choral composer consists of choral
works, some 100 of which have been published to date. He describes himself as an
eclectic traditionalist. From 2000 to 2005 he was composer-in-residence of the
Tapiola Chamber Choir, and he has also taught a course in the history of choral
music at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki. Over the years, the music of Mntyjrvi
has had an honored place in Chanticleers repertoire. Die Stimme des Kindes, the
eerie Canticum Calamitatis Maritimae, and Mntyjarvis setting of Longfellows
poem, The Tide Rises, the Tide Falls, quickly became audience favorites. We are
proud to be premiering Hommage Edith this season with the support of the Osher
Pro Suecia Foundation.

Mntyrvis harmonic palette is immediately recognizable: it encompasses both

extended harmonies (7ths, 9ths, sharp 11ths) and diminished chords. A deep
appreciation for text painting is present throughout, evidenced by his creation of an
organic ebb and flow between written and musical spheres. The work is cast in three
movements, each movement a setting of a poem by the profound and enigmatic
Edith Sdergran. Mntyjrvis music allows the listener a share in her powerful
perspectives on love. Sdergran lost her father to tuberculosis when she was a
teenager, and contracted the disease herself a year later. She lived the rest of her life
fighting the debilitating illness, weathering waves of self-doubt and depression until
her death in 1923, when she was thirty-one years of age.
Mntyjrvi writes,

Mitt hjrta r det sknaste i vrlden.

Det r heligt.
Vem som n ser det
m terstrla av dess glans.
Mitt hjrta r ltt som en fgel,
sprdare format ting fanns ej p Jorden
Jag offrar det
t en oknd gud.
Guden hgst uppe i molnen mina vingar bra mig dit den sknaste guden
infr vilken allt r stoft.
Jag skall tervnda
med ett skimmer kring min panna ingen skall se ngot annat
n natt och gud.

shall not be worn by time,

nor destroyed in fire.

Men kommer en sngare,

som mrkts utav det,
han hmtar den ter
ur bortglmda valv.
Och nr han den strngar,
d vet hela vrlden
att gudarna leva
p oanad hjd.

But when a singer comes

marked by destiny,
he shall recover it
from long-forgotten vaults.
And when he strums it,
the whole world shall know
that the gods live
on ineffable heights.

Till Eros

Sdergrans poetry was groundbreaking for her time, being unrhymed and
in free verse and focusing on experiences of the individual, often with
Futurist and Symbolist flavors. Much of her writing is dominated by a
melancholy mood, probably because of her awareness of her terminal
condition. Although initially her work was regarded as scandalously
unconventional and difficult to understand, she was championed in public
by several established authors. However, her true merit has only really been
recognized in recent decades. Her poems are frequently quoted and have
been set to music by numerous composers.
Den sknaste guden

av tiden ej ntas,
i eld ej frgs.

Eros, du grymmaste av alla gudar,

varfr frde du mig till det mrka landet?
[Nr flickebarnen vxa till
bliva de utestngda frn ljuset
och kastade i ett mrkt rum.]
Svvade icke min sjl som en lycklig stjrna
innan den blev dragen i din rda ring?
Se, jag r bunden till hnder och ftter,
knn, jag r tvungen till alla mina tankar.
Eros, du grymmaste av alla gudar
jag flyr icke, jag vntar icke,
jag lider endast som ett djur.

To Eros
Eros, thou cruelest of all gods,
why did you lead me to this dark land?
[When little girls grow up,
they are shut out of the light
and cast into a dark room.]
Did not my soul sparkle like a happy star
before it was drawn into thy red circle?
Behold, I am bound hand and foot;
know, I am slave to my thoughts.
:
Eros, thou cruelest of all gods:
I do not fly, I do not wait,
I merely suffer like an animal.

The most beautiful god

My heart is the most beautiful in the world.
It is holy.
Whoever sees it
may shine reflecting its splendor.
My heart is as light as a bird,
there is no more delicately formed thing on earth.
I offer it up
to an unknown god.
The god high up in the clouds
my wings bear me up there
the most beautiful god
before whom all is dust.
I shall return
with a shimmer around my forehead
and none shall see anything
but night and god.

Gudarnas lyra

Lyre of the gods

Var finnes vl lyran

av silver och elfenben,
den gudar frlnat
de ddligas stam?
Den r ej frlorad,
ty eviga gvor

Where is that lyre

of silver and ivory
that the gods have entrusted
to this mortal race?
It is not lost,
for eternal gifts

Go, lovely rose Eric Whitacre (b. 1970)

An accomplished composer, conductor and lecturer, Eric Whitacre has received
composition awards from ASCAP, the Barlow International Composition
Competition, the American Choral Directors Association, and the American
Composers Forum. In 2001, he became the youngest recipient ever awarded the
coveted Raymond C. Brock commission by the American Choral Directors
Association; commercially, he has worked with such luminaries as Barbra Streisand
and Marvin Hamlisch. In the last ten years, he has conducted concerts of his choral
and symphonic music in Japan, Australia, China, Singapore and much of Europe. He
has collaborated with dozens of American universities at which he regularly conducts
seminars and lectures with young musicians. He received his M.M. in composition
from the Juilliard School of Music, where he studied composition with Pulitzer
Prize-winner John Corigliano.
Go, lovely rose was composed when Whitacre was twenty-one years old and a
student at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. This piece exhibits pandiatonicism, a
harmonic device which utilizes notes within a diatonic scale (without chromatic
notes) to create dissonant chords that would become the trademark of Whitacres
later compositions. The text is a poem by the Elizabethan poet Edmund Waller.

Go, lovely rose

Tell her that wastes her time and me,
That now she knows,
When I resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her thats young,
And shuns to have her graces spied,
That hadst thou sprung
In deserts where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.
Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired;
Bid her come forth,
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.
Then die! That she
The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee;
How small a part of time they share,
That are so wondrous sweet and fair!

Ah! May the Red Rose Live Alway! Stephen Foster (1826 - 1864), arr. John Musto
John Mustos take on Stephen Fosters essentially simple song is typical of this
Brooklyn-born composer at his best. There is a sincerity of approach to the text, a
thorough knowledge of counterpoint and an appreciation of the power of
dissonances, all wrapped up in music that is easily accessible and yet provocative.
Repeated hearings bring great rewards with Mustos music, as substantiated by his
numerous professional awards and concert appearances. During his distinguished
career he has won two Emmys, two CINE awards, and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist
for his orchestral song cycle Dove sta amore. Chanticleer audiences may be familiar
with Five Motets, a work which he composed for the group in 2001.
Over the course of Fosters six verses, Musto turns what might seem to be a rather
plain song-with-accompaniment into a richly textured choral work in Ah! May the
Red Rose Live Alway! Even so, certain things that seem typical of Foster never
change. For instance, the calm, lyrical gait implies a gentle lullaby. The closeness of
the harmonic writing draws the listener into the sound-world of a post-Civil War
parlor. Mustos closer involvement with the text is ever at work, however. The tune
is transposed and transformed -- superseded by harmonic figurations and an imitative
density which mirrors the poems existential sadness and even outrage. The repeated
Why? Why? becomes central to Mustos setting and we realize that those
repetitions are as central to this arrangement as anything else. The question Why
must the innocent hide their heads? begins to lodge itself more firmly in the
listeners ears and heart. The disarming simplicity of Foster re-asserts itself at the
very end. The bits of the piano introduction which Musto has used as a ritornello
between the verses have helped us to turn inward with a kind of bittersweet calm. We

are left with that lingering sense of Why? which is far more unsettling than the
simpler, Oh, too bad
Ah! May the red rose live alway
to smile upon earth and sky!
Why should the beautiful ever weep?
Why should the beautiful die?
Lending a charm to every ray,
that falls on her cheeks of light.
Giving the zephyr kiss for kiss,
and nursing the dewdrop bright.
Long may the daisies dance the field,
frolicking far and near!
Why should the innocent hide their heads?
Why should the beautiful die?
Spreading their petals in mute delight,
when morn in its radiance breaks.
Keeping a floral festival
till the night-loving primrose wakes.
Lulled be the dirge in the cypress bough
that tells of departed flowers!
Ah! That the butterfly's gilded wing
fluttered in evergreen bowers!
Sad is my heart for the blighted plants.
Its pleasures are aye as brief.
They bloom at the young year's joyful call,
and fade with the autumn leaf.

Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair Foster, arr. Gene Puerling
Stephen Fosters ethereal Jeanie with the Light Brown Hair was written in 1854,
just a year after his failed marriage to Jane McDowell. It is widely accepted that the
Jeanie in the song refers to his ex-wife and his constant love and admiration for
her, including her physical beauty. Despite the songs modern popularity, the sheet
music of this song did not benefit Foster during his lifetime. He collected just over
$200 in royalties for the first few years after it was published. Due to financial
hardship, he sold the rights to Jeanie and other songs to sustain himself. After his
death in 1864, the copyright renewals went to his wife Jane and his daughter Marion.
The late Gene Puerling was a master arranger and director in the field of vocal jazz,
and his signature style can be heard in arrangements written for and performed by
the Hi-Los, Singers Unlimited, the Manhattan Transfer, and Chanticleer, among
others. Although Puerling did not receive formal music instruction in his youth, he
became a professional working musician at the age of seventeen and displayed
monumental skill in blending contemporary pop, calypso, barbershop, and musical
theater styles into his arrangements over the course of his musical career. This

arrangement showcases Puerlings typical kaleidoscope of harmonies, which serve as

underpinnings to the haunting melody.
I dream of Jeanie with the light brown hair,
borne like a vapor on the summer air.
I see her tripping where the bright streams play,
happy as the daisies that dance on her way.
Many were the wild notes her merry voice would pour,
many were the blithe birds that warbled them oer.
I dream of Jeanie with the light brown hair,
floating like a vapor on the soft summer air.
I long for Jeanie and my heart bows low,
never more to find her where the bright waters flow.

This Marriage Whitacre

This Marriage, which sets a beautiful love poem by the 13th century Persian poet
Mevlana Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi, was composed in 2005 as a gift to
Whitacres wife, soprano Hila Plitmann, on the occasion of their seventh wedding
anniversary. The song is simple and sweet. With only one exception the vocal lines
are doubled throughout soprano with tenor, alto with bass a musical marriage, as
it were. All of the chords are in root position, which support a strong harmonic
foundation that moves in parallel motion. The rhythmic flow is constantly dictated
by the text and the poem ends with a wordless, and otherworldly, sigh of joy, I am
out of words to describe how spirit mingles in this marriage.
May these vows and this marriage be blessd.
May it be sweet milk,
like wine and halvah.
May this marriage offer fruit and shade
like the date palm.
May this marriage be full of laughter,
our every day a day in paradise.
May this marriage be a sign of compassion,
a seal of happiness here and hereafter.
May this marriage have a fair face and a good name,
an omen as welcomes the moon in a clear blue sky.
I am out of words to describe
how spirit mingles in this marriage.

My Blood is Blazing with Desire Mikhail Glinka (1804 - 1857)

Mikhail Glinka is most known for his epic opera Ivan Susanin (originally titled A
Life for the Tsar) and his many symphonic compositions. His songs and romances for
solo voice and small ensembles are beloved by singers and audiences for their charm
and the seeming simplicity of the beautiful and graceful melodies. Glinkas stylized
simplicity resembles that of Schubert, hiding the mastery of artistic detail behind the
unpretentious faade of a salon impromptu.
My Blood is Blazing with Desire, here arranged for a choir of mixed voices, was
written in 1838, after Pushkins poetic setting of The Song of Songs, and employs
sultry chromaticism as the calling card of the passionate Orient. General Orientalism
is fused seamlessly here with another convention a ballroom waltz--which only
enhances the songs allure.

,
,
:
.
,
,

.

My blood is blazing with desire,

My stricken soul for you does pine.
Oh, kiss me now! Your kisses fire
Is sweeter far than myrrh and wine.
Incline your head to me but softly
And tamed, Ill linger with you calmly
Until the cheerful light of day
Chases the gloom of night away.

Behold, darkness has fallen Sergey Taneyev (1856 - 1915)

Sergei Taneyev was a pupil of Tchaikovsky and his close friend, but one could hardly
find two men more different in personality, creative approach to music and,
subsequently, creative output. I play Bach gladly, Tchaikovsky wrote, but I do not
recognize in him (as some do) a great genius. Handel has for me a fourth-rate
significance Taneyev, on the other hand, had a strong affinity for music of the
High Renaissance, the Late Baroque and Viennese Classicism. The path of
Palestrina, Lasso, Bach and Handel divided and ventured northeastward in Taneyevs
works, wrote the Russian musicologist Boris Asafiev.
Tchaikovsky and Taneyev also differed in their opinion concerning the role
inspiration and intuition play in creative work. Tchaikovsky believed that the
beginning of any creative process lay in an intuitively found image, born in a
moment of inspiration, whereas Taneyev asserted that an observant mind and
minutely detailed work should precede (if not replace) inspiration. It is true that
creativity does not exist without inspiration, but in creative moments a man does not
produce something that is entirely new; he simply combines what already exists in
him and what he had acquired while studying and working, he wrote in a letter to
Tchaikovsky. Taneyev lived and worked immersed in a world of ideas and abstract
concepts, writes Asafiev.

Indeed, Taneyev, both as a person and as a composer, avoided raw emotionalism and
spontaneity of expression. So it is not surprising that in Taneyevs musical language
the dominant place belonged to polyphony. Therein he found the means for
expressing both his aesthetical views and his personality. He tried to find the forms
that would reflect the general laws of reason and express the eternal and enduring
principles of human existence. According to Taneyev, only polyphony, with its
unpersonified and supranational principals and devices that did not rely on transient
emotions, would give the composer a real opportunity to express the universal as
opposed to the subjective; only counterpoint provided the precise, simple and
almost algebraic method that the composer may use in his search for subjective
truth. Finally, technically speaking, only counterpoint gave each voice the
opportunity to produce a melodic line, thus extracting the most out of the musical
texture.
Taneyevs finest compositions his cantatas John of Damascus and At the Reading
of a Psalm, as well as his numerous choruses pay tribute to the success of his
intellectual approach to composing. His greatest works are unified by a sincere (and
characteristic) endeavor to express high aspirations by rising above the feelings of
individuals to principles that are universal. Sergey Taneyev wrote thirty-seven
secular a cappella choruses and a number of vocal ensembles that are often
performed as choruses. Behold, darkness has fallen is one of the choruses from his
monumental cycle of twelve choral poems, op. 27, composed on the text of Yakov
Polonski (1819-1898). The cycle is considered the pinnacle of Taneyevs choral
output.
,
!


.
,
!



,
.

!

Behold, darkness has fallen

In the depths of the valleys.
Under their transparent haze
In slumbering twilight
A lake shimmers.
Behold, darkness has fallen
In the depths of the valleys.
Behold, a pale, homeless moon,
Moves invisibly through the skies
Among the host of grey clouds,
Glazing everything
With its phosphorescent light
Behold, darkness has fallen
In the depths of the valley.

Vocalise Sergei Rachmaninoff (1873 1943), arr. Elger Niels

Sergei Rachmaninoff composed in a period of Russian romanticism which began in
the 1880s and lasted until the Communist takeover in 1917. In terms of choral music,
it was a time when dozens of Russian composers, from such prominent figures as
Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov to lesser-known choral specialists such as
Kastalsky, Chesnokov, Gretchaninoff, and Nikolsky, focused their creative energies
on texts drawn from the Russian Orthodox liturgy.

By the first decade of the twentieth century, Rachmaninoff was spending his
summers at the secluded Ivanovka estate, which was owned by his uncle, Alexander
Satin. It is believed that he drew much inspiration from this peaceful and bucolic
landscape, which allowed him to escape the demands of urban life and concentrate
on the compositional demands facing him during the year. Vocalise, Opus 34, No.
14, consists of a wordless soprano melody (sung on a vowel selected by the
performer) superimposed on a hushed and dense choral texture, rife with rich,
Romantic harmonies. The ebb and flow of this dialogue is tremendous, for it depicts
the versatility and restraint that is prevalent in much of Rachmaninoffs music. The
beauty lies entirely in the soundscape; the absence of words creates an expressive
sonic experience that creates tension and release for the listener. The piece was
originally written for piano and voice, serving as the final song in the series. Due to
its instant success, Rachmaninoff arranged it for orchestra and voice, as well as for
orchestra alone.
Love Songs Augusta Read Thomas (b. 1964)
Augusta Read Thomas held teaching posts at Eastman School of Music and
Northwestern University before settling at her current post of Professor of
Composition at University of Chicago. Today, she is in high demand as a composer,
receiving ample opportunities during her tenure as Composer-in-Residence for the
Chicago Symphony from 1997-2006. Thomass Concerto for Orchestra was
commissioned and premiered by that orchestra under the direction of Pierre Boulez
in 1998. Her chamber opera Ligeia, commissioned and premiered by Mstislav
Rostropovich and the Evian Festival in 1994, won the International Orpheus Prize,
and has been presented at the Spoleto Music Festival in Italy and the Aspen Music
Festival in Colorado.
Love Songs, commissioned by Chanticleer, treats the group as an ensemble of 12
soloists; the five movements sung in this program are from a set of seven famous
epigrams about love, each of which provides a springboard for more extended
experiments in choral texture. Love Songs appears on Chanticleers Colors of Love
album, which won a Grammy for Best Small Ensemble Performance in 1999.
The wonderful sound-world created by the unique and
beautiful color of their 12 sublime voices allied to their
abundance of technical skill makes Chanticleer my favorite
ensemble. Love Songs is a 15-minute score made up of seven
songs composed specifically for this sound of their individual,
extraordinary voices. Each of the men has at least one small
solo which was precisely imagined and composed for his
specific vocal color. The texts, all classic love poems, are set in
a variety of ways ranging from lyrical to humorous to sensuous.
I hope you enjoy the pieces because they were loads of fun for
me to compose! Augusta Read Thomas

II. Look out upon the stars, my love

III. Love is a beautiful dream.
V. Alas, the love of women! It is known to be a lovely and a fearful
thing.
VI. For stony limits cannot hold love out.
VII. All mankind love a lover.

Ill Follow My Secret Heart Nol Coward (1899 - 1973), arr. Adam Ward
Nobody could turn a phrase like Nol Coward. He is surely considered to be one of
the more witty, idiosyncratic and memorable English composers of the twentieth
century. At the forefront of his popularity, of course, were the thirty-seven stage
plays and nine musicals. The mention of Bitter Sweet, Conversation Piece, Private
Lives or Blithe Spirit is bound to conjure a smile from lovers of his timeless romantic
comedies. Ill Follow My Secret Heart is arguably the most popular song from
Conversation Piece, which opened at His Majestys Theatre in London in February
of 1934. The all-star cast included Coward himself and the versatile French actress
Yvonne Printemps.
Coward, never shy, talked about the difficulties he encountered in the composition of
this, the most well-known song of the show:
I poured myself a large whisky and soda... and sat
gloomily envisaging everyone's disappointment and
facing the fact that my talent had withered and that
I should never write any more music until the day I
died. ... I switched off the light at the door and
noticed that there was one lamp left on by the piano.
I walked automatically to turn it off, sat down, and
played "I'll Follow My Secret Heart" straight
through in G flat, a key I had never played in
before.
Adam Ward, who is in his eleventh year singing countertenor with Chanticleer, adds
his own words to Cowards. The song is sung by the female protagonist who being
set up for marriage, only to secretly fall in love with the man making the
arrangements. In this version we hear a truncated recitative which facilitates the
swap from the perspective of the original female character to that of the male soloist.

Regardless of context or gender, the song is a statement of honesty to ones self

while patiently waiting for true love to transpire.
No matter what price is paid
What stars may fade above,
I'll follow my secret heart
Till I find love
Don't be afraid I'll betray you
And destroy all the plans you have made.
But even your schemes must
Leave room for my dreams.
So when all I owe you is paid,
I'll still have something of my own,
A little prize that's mine alone
I'll follow my secret heart
My whole life through
I'll keep all my dreams apart
Till one comes true.
No matter what price is paid
What stars may fade above,
I'll follow my secret heart
Till I find love

It was a lover and his lass John Rutter (b. 1945)

One of the most performed of living composers, John Rutter has made the choral
idiom his lifes work and artistic home. From 1975 to 1979 he was Director of Music
at Clare College, whose choir he directed in a number of broadcasts and recordings.
After resigning from the Clare post to allow more time for composition, he formed
the Cambridge Singers as a professional chamber choir primarily dedicated to
recording, and now divides his time between composition and conducting. In 2002
his setting of Psalm 150, commissioned for the Queens Golden Jubilee, was
performed at the Service of Thanksgiving in St. Pauls Cathedral, London.
It was a lover and his lass (text by one Will Shakespeare!) is a ditty that spins circles
around the playful and exhilarating relationship between two lovers. The
accompaniments lightly swung rhythms provide contrast to the buoyant melody
which itself is jolly, crisp and instantly appealing.
It was a lover and his lass,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonny,
That o'er the green corn-field did pass,
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time,
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;
Sweet lovers love the spring.
Between the acres of the rye,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonny,
These pretty country folks would lie,

In the spring time, the only pretty ring time,

When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;
Sweet lovers love the spring.
This carol they began that hour,
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonny,
How that life was but a flower
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time,
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;
Sweet lovers love the spring.
And, therefore, take the present time
With a hey, and a ho, and a hey nonny,
For love is crown`d with the prime
In the spring time, the only pretty ring time,
When birds do sing, hey ding a ding, ding;
Sweet lovers love the spring.

Les Chemins de lAmour Francis Poulenc (1899 - 1963), arr. Evan Price
French composer and pianist Francis Poulenc was a member of Les Six, a group of
composers working in Paris in the first part of the twentieth century. Poulenc
eschewed the daring harmonic language of many of his contemporaries (he once
wrote, I think there is room for new music which doesnt mind using other peoples
chords). He found, instead, a musical language that is easily recognizable in his
numerous compositions, most notably his songs and choral music. The desire to
compose for a cappella chorus came to Poulenc after hearing a performance of
Monteverdi madrigals presented by Nadia Boulanger. His a cappella output runs the
gamut from light entertainment to religiously fervent motets, reflecting the
dichotomy of Poulencs own profound spirituality and bon vivant proclivities.
Bay Area resident Evan Price has arranged Poulencs Les Chemins de lAmour for
Chanticleer, often utilizing voices to portray accompaniment and melodic textures.
He states,
I first became acquainted with Les Chemins de lAmour several
years ago when it was added to the repertoire of my long-time
band, The Hot Club of San Francisco. We performed it far and
wide as part of our original score for the 1928 silent film, The
Fall of the House of Usher." Consequently, my dominant
association with the piece is somewhat more macabre than was
the composers intention and, given the task of scoring it for
Chanticleer, I had to learn the piece anew. Traditionally
performed as a soprano solo with piano accompaniment, this
setting has more of the feel of a piece of chamber music with the
melody and accompaniment shared among the voices. In
particular, the bass section has to occupy many rolesfrom
singing the melody to mimicking a pianists left hand.

Les chemins qui vont la mer

Ont gard de notre passage,
Des fleurs effeuilles
Et l'cho sous leurs arbres
De nos deux rires clairs.
Hlas! des jours de bonheur,
Radieuses joies envoles,
Je vais sans retrouver traces
again
Dans mon cur.

The paths that lead to the sea

have kept, of our passing-by,
flowers with fallen petals
and the echo, beneath their trees,
of both our bright laughs.
Alas! of the days of happiness,
radiant joys now flown,
I wander without finding their trace

Chemins de mon amour,

Je vous cherche toujours,
Chemins perdus, vous n'tes plus
Et vos chos sont sourds.
Chemins du dsespoir,
Chemins du souvenir,
Chemins du premier jour,
Divins chemins d'amour.

Paths of my love,
I still seek you,
lost paths, you are no more
and your echoes are hollow.
Paths of despair,
paths of memory,
paths of the first day,
divine paths of love.

Si je dois l'oublier un jour,

La vie effaant toute chose,
Je veut, dans mon cur, qu'un souvenir repose
Plus fort que l'autre amour.
Le souvenir du chemin,
O tremblante et toute perdue,
Un jour j'ai senti sur moi
Brler tes mains.

in my heart.

If one day I have to forget him,

life effacing everything,
,I wish, in my heart, that one memory should remain,
stronger than the other love.
The memory of the path,
where trembling and utterly bewildered
one day, upon me, I felt
your hands burning.

La vie en Rose dith Piaf (1915 - 1963), arr. Price

The dith Piaf classic, La Vie en Rose, is perhaps one of the most beloved and
charming French torch songs of the twentieth century. Piaf commissioned and
performed pieces of music that romanticized her rough upbringing and her life in the
streets, boasting passionate and empowering lyrics which emphasize her inner
fortitude.
La Vie en Rose is inspired by an amorous moment in 1944 when Piaf locked eyes
with a young American. This piece is lauded as a true lovers anthem, literally
translated as life in pink, which reminds us all to alter our perspectives and view
anew the romance and beauty that color our everyday life.
Des yeux qui font baisser les miens,
Un rire qui se perd sur sa bouche,
Voil le portrait sans retouche
de l'homme auquel j'appartiens.
Quand il me prend dans ses bras
Il me parle tout bas,
Je vois la vie en rose.
Il me dit des mots d'amour,
Des mots de tous les jours,

Eyes that gaze into mine,

A smile that is lost on his lips,
That is the untouched portrait
Of the man whom I belong.
When he takes me into his arms
He speaks to me softly,
And I see life through rose-colored glasses
He speaks words of love to me,
They are everyday words,

Et a me fait quelque chose.

And they do something to me.

Il est entr dans mon cur

Une part de bonheur
Dont je connais la cause.
C'est lui pour moi, moi pour lui dans la vie,
Il me l'a dit, l'a jur pour la vie.

He has entered into my heart

A bit of happiness
That I know the cause of.
Its only him for me, and me for him, for life,
He told me, he swore to me, for life.

Et ds que je l'aperois
Alors je sens en moi
Mon cur qui bat.

As soon as I notice him

I feel inside me
My heart beating.

Des nuits d'amour ne plus en finir

Un grand bonheur qui prend sa place
Des ennuis, des chagrins, s'effacent
Heureux, heureux en mourir.

Endless nights of love

Bring great happiness
The pain and bothers fade away
Happy, so happy I could die.

Frankie and Johnny Trad. American Song, arr. Robert De Cormier

In 1899, a murder in St. Louis became the subject for one of Americas top
folksongs, also referred to as a murder ballad. Frankie and Johnny depicts Frankie
Bakers indignation when she found out her lover, Albert Britt, was being unfaithful
to her. This infidelity led Frankie to find a gun and shoot Albert at a boardinghouse
for retribution. The factual details surrounding the murder case are quite cloudy:
some people were convinced that Frankie was a victim of ongoing domestic
violence, others thought that she was just tired of working the streets for her lover.
Some just thought they had had a particularly nasty argument.
Rumor has it that Albert Britts parents had kindly requested one of the early
songwriters to use an alias for Albert to protect the family from future social
hardship. Frankie and Johnny has been recorded by a myriad of notable artists such
as Sam Cooke, Elvis Presley, Guy Lombardo, and Johnny Cash. It continues to be a
popular story, and one easily adapted to various musical genres.

Love Walked In George Gershwin (1898 - 1937), arr. Puerling

The first half of the twentieth century saw American popular music flourish and take
the world by storm. Access to records and record-players allowed worldwide
listeners to hear the latest hits, ushering in an era dominated by the great songwriters
and lyricists from the 1920s in Tin Pan Alley through the Broadway and Hollywood
musicals of the 1950s. The brightest stars of this era (George Gershwin, Harold
Arlen, Duke Ellington, Cole Porter, and Irving Berlin, among several others) are
credited with creating and contributing to the Great American Songbook a
generally agreed-upon collection of the most popular and memorable songs of the
era. Today, jazz and popular musicians simply call these songs standards. George
and his older brother, Ira, were known as a dynamic and highly intelligent duo that
worked symbiotically. Ira was known as an expressive lyricist and George was
known for his musical offerings.
In Loved Walked In, Puerlings harmonic language can be described as elegant and
smooth, but undeniably complex. The jazz harmonies often employ major sevenths,
ninths, elevenths, and thirteenths as the voices become more distant and spread. The
homophonic nature of the piece allows for the chords in close harmony to settle and
shimmer as suspensions and dissonances stress certain words or ideas.
Love walked right in and drove the shadows away
Love walked right in and brought my sunniest day
One magic moment and my heart seemed to know that my heart said hello
Though not a word was spoken
One look, and I forgot the gloom of the past
One look and I had found my future at last
One look and I had found a world completely new
When love walked in with you

Frankie and Johnny were lovers

Lordy, how they could love.
Swore to be true to each other
Just as true as the stars above.
He was her man,
But he was doing her wrong.
Frankie went down to the corner.
Just for a bucket of beer
And when she got there,
She asked that bartender,
Has my ever loving Johnny been here?
He was my man, but hes been doing me wrong.
Bartender: I dont want to cause you no trouble,
I dont want to tell you no lie,
But I saw your man bout an hour ago,
a lovin Nellie Bly.
If hes your man, hes been doing you wrong.
Frankie went down to the hotel
Walked right up to the door
And underneath her fancy dress
She had Johnnys forty-four.
He was her man
But he was doing her wrong.
When Johnny first saw Frankie
For the back door he did scoot
Frankie pulled that forty-four gun,
Went root-ta-toot, toot-ta-toot, toot.
She shot her man
Cause he was doing her wrong
Johnny: Turn me over easy,
Roll me over slow,
Turn me on my left side,

So my heart wont overflow.

I was her man,
But I was doing her wrong.
This story has no moral
This story has no end
This story only goes to prove
That there aint no good in men.

I just keep losing my beat

I'm OK, I'm alright
Ain't gonna face no defeat
I just gotta get out of this prison cell
One day I'm gonna be free, Lord!
Find me somebody to love
Can anybody find me somebody to love?

Frankie: Theyll do you wrong,

Just as sure as you born.

Somebody to Love Freddie Mercury (1946-1991), arr. Vince Peterson

Somebody to Love was first heard on Queens 1976 album, A Day at the Races; it
was the hit single of the album, eventually hitting the number 2 spot on the UK
single charts. It is also one of the most ubiquitously played and most popular songs
that Queen is known for. Freddie Mercury admitted that he drew much of his
musical inspiration from Aretha Franklin, which allowed him to inject multiple
gospel flavors into some of his pieces. The band multi-tracked several voice parts in
the recording studio to emulate a 100-voiced gospel choir, an effect that accentuates
the imploring quality for love that Mercury desired for the song. Vince Peterson
arranged an intricate and dense vocal chart for Chanticleer in 2011 and, since its
debut, it has been loved and requested by audiences worldwide.
Can anybody find me somebody to love?
Each morning I get up I die a little
Can barely stand on my feet
Take a look in the mirror and cry
Lord what you're doing to me
I have spent all my years in believing you
But I just can't get no relief, Lord!
Somebody, somebody
Can anybody find me somebody to love?
I work hard every day of my life
I work 'til I ache my bones
At the end I take home my hard earned pay all on my own
I get down on my knees and I start to pray
'Til the tears run down from my eyes, Oh!
Somebody, somebody
Anybody find me somebody to love?
Everyday!
I try and I try and I try
But everybody wants to put me down
They say I'm goin' crazy
They say I got a lot of water in my brain
I got no common sense
I got nobody left to believe
Yeah, yeah, yeah!
Got no feel, I got no rhythm

AN ORCHESTRA OF VOICES
2016-17 Season Biographies
ERIC ALATORRE, bass, joined Chanticleer in the last century. Really. Now in his 27th
season, he is the provider of much of the Chanticleer lore from former times and is enjoying
sharing the joy of singing with some of his colleagues who are, quite literally, a new
generation of singers. He still enjoys being able to perform all over the country and the world,
which gives him plenty of time to explore his other passion: food. A part-time hedonist and
full-time wine enthusiast, he is always looking for another wonderful dining experience to
share with friends and his fellow singers on the road. His other passions include eating his way
around the world, being married to his wonderful wife Dorothee, and enjoying watching his
daughters Mia and Clara discover the joys of learning English, German and Spanish.
CHRIS ALBANESE is a young tenor and conductor noted for his ability to bring intelligent
and spirited musical interpretations to a wide variety of repertoire.
Before joining
Chanticleer, Chris was a doctoral candidate in Choral Conducting at the University of
Cincinnati-College Conservatory of Music, where he also served as director of the University
of Cincinnati Men's Chorus, and as chorus master and assistant conductor for CCM opera
productions. He has served on the choral faculties of Xavier University and Archbishop
McNicholas High School, and has presented clinics and master classes for the Ohio Music
Education Association, the Archdiocese of Cincinnati, along with numerous high schools and
universities in the Midwest. As a soloist, he has appeared most recently with the Cincinnati

Bach Festival, Dayton Opera, Cincinnati Chamber Orchestra, Cincinnatis Vocal Arts
Ensemble, and under the baton of Maestro Lorin Maazel at the Castleton Festival. Chris holds
a BM in Music Education and Vocal Performance from the University of Dayton, and an MM
in Vocal Performance from Northwestern University. His most recent teachers include Ken
Shaw (voice), Earl Rivers, and Brett Scott (conducting). Outside of music, Chris is a proud
uncle, amateur chef, golf enthusiast, and die-hard Cleveland sports fan. This is his first season
with Chanticleer.
BRIAN HINMAN, tenor, is in his eleventh season with Chanticleer. Born in the suburbs of
Chicago, he spent his childhood singing in choirs. Brian studied vocal performance at the
University of Tennessee in addition to acting at the Larry Singer Studios and jazz with Joe
Solomon, both in New York City. He has sung with rock bands, bluegrass bands and gospel
choirs and has a long string of theater credits including lead roles in regional productions
of Company and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. This is also Brian's ninth
season as Chanticleer's Road Manager. He recently Co-Produced Chanticleer's latest pop/jazz
studio album, Someone New, with Leslie Ann Jones and Jace Wittig.
MATTHEW KNICKMAN, baritone, is proud to be in his sixth season with Chanticleer. Born
in Korea, he started singing as a boy soprano at St. Stephens Cathedral Choir of Men and
Boys in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. He holds degrees in vocal performance and pedagogy from
Westminster Choir College. As a member of the critically acclaimed Westminster Choir and
Westminster Kantorei, he performed with the New York Philharmonic, Dresden Philharmonic,
& New Jersey Symphony, and was led by celebrated conductors, including Alan Gilbert, Lorin
Maazel, Kurt Masur, Harry Bicket, Charles Dutoit, Rafael Frhbeck de Burgos, Richard
Hickox, Neeme Jrvi, Bernard Labadie, Nicholas McGegan, Julius Rudel, Stefan Parkman,
Joseph Flummerfelt, and Andrew Megill. He has also performed with Les Violons du Roy et
La Chapelle de Qubec, Early Music New York, Choir of Trinity Wall Street, Saint Thomas
Choir of Men and Boys, Opera Company of Philadelphia, Opera Theatre of Weston, and
Spoleto Festival U.S.A. He has been a soloist in numerous oratorios and Bach cantatas,
including the St. John and St. Matthew Passions with early music organizations such as Fuma
Sacra, Philadelphia Bach Festival, and Carmel Bach Festival. He has also been a Finalist in the
Sixth Biennial Bach Vocal Competition for American Singers. Recently, he has performed as a
soloist with Santa Clara Chorale, San Jose Chamber Orchestra, and Symphony Silicon Valley.
When not singing, Matthew enjoys eating comfort foods around the world, and is an exercise
and nutritional science enthusiast.
CORTEZ MITCHELL, counterternor, is a native of Detroit, MI. He graduated from Morgan
State University with a B.A. in music and a B.S. in mathematics and holds an M.M. in voice
from the University of Cincinnati's College Conservatory of Music. As Minnesota Opera's
first resident artist countertenor he performed the role of Cherubino in Mozart's Le Nozze di
Figaro and covered Nicklausse in Offenbach's Les Contes de Hoffman. With Urban Opera he
performed the role of 1 st Witch in Purcells Dido and Aneas. He has been featured in solo
performances of J.S Bach's Cantata#147 Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben with the Dayton
Philharmonic, R. Nathaniels Dett's The Ordering of Moses and Adolphus Hailstork's Done
Made My Vow with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Rachmaniov's Vespers in St.
Petersburg Russia, and Wynton Marsallis's All Rise with the Lincoln Center Jazz
Ensemble. Cortez has received awards from the National Opera Association, The Washington
International competition and the Houston Grand Opera Elleanor McCollum competition. Mr.
Mitchell is in his tenth season with Chanticleer.

GERROD PAGENKOPF, countertenor, is excited to be singing a second season with

Chanticleer. A native of Northeast Wisconsin, Gerrod received his Bachelors of music
education from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and also holds a Masters degree in vocal
performance from the University of Houston where he was a graduate fellow under Katherine
Ciesinski. A specialist in early music, Gerrod has performed with many early music
ensembles throughout Boston and Houston including Ars Lyrica Houston, the Handel and
Haydn Society, Blue Heron Renaissance Choir, Exsultemus, and the prestigious Church of the
Advent in Boston's Beacon Hill. In his spare time, Gerrod enjoys exploring San Francisco,
geeking out to 17th century Italian madrigals, and finding the best iced coffee in every city he
visits!
KORY REID, counterternor & assistant music director, is in his sixth season with Chanticleer.
He studied music education at Pepperdine University and completed a Masters Degree in
Choral Conducting from the University of Southern California. Kory is a sought after
countertenor soloist who has sung for Los Angeles Zimriyah Chorale, Los Robles Master
Chorale, Catgut Trio, USC Chamber Singers, Pepperdine University Concert Choir and
Collegium Musicum, and for many diverse choral recitals and church music programs,
including Mel Gibson's church. He is a barbershop music enthusiast and was a past member of
the Westminster Chorus, winning the International Barbershop Chorus Contest in 2010. Kory
also served as the Music and Choir Director for St. Matthews United Methodist Church in
Newbury Park, CA. In his spare time, he enjoys watching eccentric documentaries, drinking
wine, and teaching barbershop tags to his Chanticleer brothers on the road. Kory would like to
give a shout out to his beautiful wife, Madeleine!
ALAN REINHARDT, counterternor, is pleased to be in his eleventh season with Chanticleer.
He grew up in Long Island, N.Y. and prior to joining sang with various ensembles in New
York City including The Men and Boys choir at St. Thomas Church on Fifth Avenue, Early
Music New York and choral performances with the N.Y. Philharmonic. In 2005, he sang the
lead countertenor role in the premiere of the dance/opera A More Perfect Union in the State
Theatre in Perm, Russia as part of the Sergei Diaghilev Festival. Recently, he has been
exploring his love of poetry on the website Voetica.com where you can find him reading such
classic poets as Robert Frost, Richard Wilbur, Walt Whitman, William Wordsworth, and John
Keats. An avid motorcyclist as well, Alan enjoys taking extensive trips in and around
California and is a frequent backpacker in the national and state parks of the West coast. Alan
holds degrees from SUNY Potsdam and the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana.
MARQUES JERRELL RUFF, bass-baritone, has been noted for having a voice that,has
power, clarity, and brilliant shades of color, by The Hartford Courant. Mr. Ruff is pleased to
be in his fourth season with Chanticleer and remains grateful for the opportunity to travel the
world fulfilling his purpose. A native of East Hartford, Connecticut, Marques is a graduate of
Central Connecticut State University where his love of choral music was cultivated under the
direction of Dr. Pamela J. Perry, and further bolstered by his decade-long tenure as a Section
Leader and soloist at the historic Asylum Hill Congregational Church. Mr. Ruff has been
privileged to appear in concert as a soloist with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra, Vivre
Musicale, CONCORA, and VOCE Inc., where he recorded Sure on This Shining Night with
American composer, Morten Lauridsen. Marques has also been the recipient of top honors
from the National Association of Teachers of Singing Voice Competition and the Classical
Singer Competition. An avid jazz, gospel, and musical theater performer, he has appeared in
regional theater productions of several plays including: Rent (Tom Collins) and Aint
Misbehavin. Prior to joining Chanticleer, Mr. Ruff recorded and released on Spotify a brand

new song cycle written specifically for his unique instrument by composer, and friend, SSG
Daniel J. Campolieta en titled, Guided Imagery.
LOGAN S. SHIELDS, countertenor, is elated to be joining Chanticleer for his first season. A
peculiarly proud Michigander, Mr. Shields studied vocal performace at Western Michigan
University and Grand Valley State University. While living in Grand Rapids, he performed
with St. Mark's Episcopal, Schola Choir of the Grand Diocese, and OperaGR. Most recently
he sang with Audivi, a professional ensemble based in Ann Arbor under the direction of Noah
Horn. Outside of the classical realm he has been featured in DownBeat Magazine's Student
Music Awards, winning "Best Blues/Pop/Rock Group of 2014" for his contributions on the
Aaron Garcia Band's album, Glass Girl. Other passions include craft beer, vegetarianism,
philisophical banter, freestyle rap, pugs, and spending time with his partner, Gabrielle.
ANDREW VAN ALLSBURG, tenor, is thrilled to begin his first season with Chanticleer.
Originally from Holland, Michigan, Andrew received his Bachelors of Music Education from
Western Michigan University in Kalamazoo, MI. During his undergraduate tenure, Andrew
performed with the University Chorale directed by Dr. James Bass, and recorded and released
an album of Monteverdis Vespers of 1610 with the Miami-based professional choir Seraphic
Fire directed by Patrick Dupr Quigley. In addition, Andrew conducted the choir of the early
music ensemble Collegium Musicum, and won a Downbeat Award with the vocal jazz
ensemble, Gold Company, under the direction of the late Dr. Steve Zegree. A versatile
performer, Andrew has performed globally for various cruise lines, production companies,
contemporary a cappella groups, musicals, and has made TV appearances on the Oprah
Winfrey Show and Last Week Tonight with John Oliver. While living in New York City,
Andrew sang with Schola Dominicana at the Church of Saint Catherine of Sienna directed by
James Wetzel, and was a featured singer in the Radio City Christmas Spectacular featuring the
Rockettes, under the musical direction of Kevin Stites. Andrew enjoys traveling, spending
time with friends and family, and can throw a mean Frisbee.
ADAM WARD, alto, is originally from Tecumseh, Oklahoma. At an early age Adam became
fascinated with the voice of Patsy Cline. As a child he made a number of television
appearances singing Clines songs. Mr. Ward began singing countertenor while studying
French horn performance at Yale University. There he was also a founding member of the Yale
Schola Cantorum under the direction of Simon Carrington. He has since performed as soloist
with the International Contemporary Ensemble and was a member of the Choir of St. Mary the
Virgin at the famed Smoky Marys in midtown Manhattan. As a horn player, Adam was a
member of the Verbier Festival Orchestra, winner of the concerto competitions at Yale and
Stony Brook Universities, and was a top prizewinner at the Coleman, Fischoff and Yellow
Springs national chamber music competitions. As a composer his works have been heard
around the world for nearly two decades. He was recently composer-in-residence for the New

York City based Choral Chameleon directed by Vince Peterson. He is also the lead singer
alongside compatriot Chelsea Eiben in the internet's beloved "poetic pop prophecy"
CHADAM. Adam holds a B.M. from Manhattan School of Music, M.M. from Yale School of
Music and additional years of study at the Hartt School, Royal College of Music (London) and
Stony Brook University. Adam is overjoyed to be in his eleventh season with Chanticleer.

WILLIAM FRED SCOTT, Music Director, was the Artistic Director of the Atlanta Opera
from 1985-2005 and the Associate Conductor of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra from 19811988a post offered him by Robert Shaw. As Associate Conductor and Artistic Administrator
of the Opera Company of Boston, he worked alongside that companys legendary founder
Sarah Caldwell from 1975-1981. He is a frequent guest conductor at many of the worlds
opera companies and symphony orchestras and the Director of Choral Music at The
Westminster Schools, Atlanta. His first encounter with Chanticleer was in 1994, when he
conducted Chanticleer and the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra in a program of music of the
Mexican Baroque.
CHRISTINE BULLIN, Chanticleer's President and General Director, oversees the
organization's artistic and administrative activities. Prior to joining Chanticleer, Ms. Bullin
served as the Director of the Centre de formation lyrique for the Opra National de Paris,
directing a new training center for singers. During her tenure there, she managed all
administrative, financial and artistic activities, and produced numerous operas and concerts.
From 1982-1993, Ms. Bullin was the Director of the San Francisco Opera Center, which she
created from existing and new programs and which is now revered throughout the operatic
world. Among her initiatives were a long-term exchange program with the Shanghai
Conservatory; and Pacific Voices, a project which involved ten Pacific Rim countries. She
was the Executive Producer for three video documentaries about the SF Opera Center,
including the Rocky Mountain Emmy-winning Scaling the Wall, featuring the historic visit of
Western Opera Theater to China. In recognition of her work in San Francisco, she was the
recipient of the Bernard Osher Cultural Award. Prior to joining the San Francisco Opera, she
directed the touring company of the Opera Company of Boston.
Ms. Bullin is a frequent panelist for the National Endowment of the Arts, and a frequent jury
member for vocal competitions. A native of New Zealand, she holds degrees from Wellesley
College and Simmons College, and was a Peace Corps volunteer in Liberia.