New Amsterdam Singers to Launch 2017-18 Season with SING, SING YE MUSES

The New Amsterdam Singers (NAS) celebrating 50 years of leadership under Music Director Clara Longstreth, launches its 2017-18 season with a program titled Sing, Sing Ye Muses, featuring a world premiere-NAS commission by Carol Barnett along with works by John Blow, J.S. Bach, Dietrich Buxtehude, Jacob Handl, Claudio Monteverdi, W.A. Mozart, and Dominick Argento, among others.

The performances will take place Friday, December 8, at 8:00 p.m. and Sunday, December 10, 2017, at 4:00 p.m. at Advent Lutheran Church, Broadway at 93rd Street.

The commission - the first of three this season in honor of Ms. Longstreth - is Carol Barnett's The Darkling Thrush for chorus and string quartet, on a poem by Thomas Hardy. Ms. Barnett is an award-winning Minnesota-based composer, and in 2012, NAS sang her bluegrass mass, "A World Beloved," originally written for the iconic bluegrass band, Monroe Crossing, and which has gained popularity throughout the United States and abroad.

NAS will employ a string quartet in another contemporary work, The Vision by Dominick Argento, on a text by Dante. Strings will also be featured in five of the Baroque works on the program. An a cappella work by Andrew Rindfleisch and a nearly a cappella work for chorus and cello by Abbie Betinis complete the program.

For further information, call (914) 712-8708 or go online to www.nasingers.org. Tickets are available at the door for $30, and $25 for seniors and students. Tickets are also available in advance online for $25, and $20 for seniors and students; by phone at the above number; or by mail (New Amsterdam Singers, P.O. Box 373, Cathedral Station, New York, NY 10025).

PROGRAM:

NEW AMSTERDAM SINGERS
Sing, Sing Ye Muses

Friday, December 8, 2017, at 8:00 p.m.
Sunday, December 10, 2017, at 4:00 pm

Advent Lutheran Church
Broadway at West 93rd Street

The Vision
Break Forth, O Beauteous Heavenly Light
The Darkling Thrush (World Premiere-NAS Commission)
At a Window (New York Premiere)
Sing, Sing Ye Muses
Befiehl dem Engel dass er komm
Duo seraphim
Beatus vir
Ave verum corpus
Praise the Lod, O Jerusalem
Rejoice in the Lord Always (Bell Anthem)
An Irish Blessing

About Clara Longstreth

In 1968 Clara Longstreth became conductor of what was then called the Master Institute Chorus. When the Master Institute dissolved in 1971, the singers regrouped as the New Amsterdam Singers, with Ms. Longstreth at the helm, where she remains today. From 1972-78, NAS was associated with the Bloomingdale House of Music; it became fully independent in 1978 under the management of its own elected Board of Directors. Over these five decades, Ms. Longstreth's tenure and programming instincts with NAS have been acknowledged by audiences and the press alike. "Clara Longstreth, the longtime music director of the estimable New Amsterdam Singers, has a gift for devising adventurous programs with interesting juxtapositions," wrote Anthony Tommasini in The New York Times. Allan Kozinn, writing in the same publication, noted: "When a director takes up the challenge of building a cohesive program around a broad theme, we are reminded that programming can be an art."

Clara Longstreth has also served on the faculty of Rutgers University, where she conducted the Voorhees Choir of Douglas College. A student of conductor G. Wallace Woodworth at Harvard University, Ms. Longstreth trained for her master's degree at The Juilliard School under Richard Westenberg. Further study included work with Amy Kaiser and Semyon Bychkov at the Mannes College of Music, and with Helmuth Rilling at the Oregon Bach Festival. She has guest-conducted the Limo?n Dance Company in performances with NAS and the Riverside Choir, and with NAS and the Mannes College Orchestra in the folk opera, "Down in the Valley" during a Symphony Space "Wall to Wall Kurt Weill" program. In 2009 she received an Alumnae Recognition Award from Radcliffe College for her founding and longtime direction of New Amsterdam Singers.

About the New Amsterdam Singers

Hailed as an "excellent avocational choir" by The New Yorker, New Amsterdam Singers is known for the breadth and variety of its repertoire. The ensemble specializes in a cappella and double chorus works, presenting music from the 16th century to contemporary pieces, including many it has commissioned.

Over the course of its 50-year history, the chorus of 70-plus singers has performed nine world- premiere commissions in addition to another 14 world premieres, eight American premieres, and 62 New York and New York City premieres. This programming reflects Ms. Longstreth's desire to focus efforts on lesser-known works by pre-eminent composers and on new works by living composers. Among them have been Matthew Harris, Paul Alan Levi, Ronald Perera, Ben Moore, Elizabeth Lim, Katherine Hoover, Alla Borzova, Charles Fussell, Einojuhani Rautavaara, Richard Rodney Bennett, Petr Eben, Robert Paterson, Abbie Betinis, Kirke Mechem, Steven Stucky, Luna Pearl Woolf, Ruth Watson Henderson, and Daniel Pinkham.

New Amsterdam Singers has performed with the New York Philharmonic under Leonard Bernstein; American Russian Youth Orchestra at Carnegie Hall; at Tanglewood's Ozawa Hall under Leon Botstein; Concordia Orchestra and Anonymous Four in Richard Einhorn's Voices of Light with Marin Alsop at Avery Fisher Hall; and with the Limo?n Dance Company in Koda?ly's Missa Brevis. On March 13, 2016, NAS presented Golgotha, a 90-minute oratorio for chorus, orchestra, organ, and soloists by the Swiss composer Frank Martin in its first performance since 1952, as part of the Trinity Wall Street Concert Series. In 2013 the singers performed in South Africa, in 2015, in Greece, and in 2017, Iceland.

Photo Credit: Jennifer Taylor