The Ithaca Community Chorus and Chamber Singers are taking audiences on a tour of operatic history this winter, with a concert devoted to great opera choruses spanning more than three centuries.
Music director Gerald Wolfe says the program offers breadth rather than bravado. “My title was ‘Great Opera Choruses,’” Wolf explained with a laugh. “Our PR person got a little carried away. It’s really a selection of the great ones.”
The concert opens with what Wolf calls the earliest opera still regularly performed, Monteverdi’s Orfeo, and moves through works by Purcell, Verdi, Puccini, Mascagni, Mussorgsky, Beethoven, Humperdinck, and John Adams. “It’s really a nice variety,” he said. “We have the Witches’ Chorus from Macbeth, the Hebrew Slaves’ Chorus from Nabucco, the Humming Chorus from Madama Butterfly, the Easter Hymn from Cavalleria rusticana, and the Coronation Scene from Boris Godunov—just to name a few.”
Several choruses are performed by smaller forces, including women’s voices alone in Macbeth and Hansel and Gretel, while the Chamber Singers take on one of the most emotionally charged moments in contemporary opera: the Chorus of the Exiled Jews from John Adams’s The Death of Klinghoffer. “It’s controversial, but it’s also hauntingly beautiful,” Wolf said.
The program challenges singers linguistically as well as musically. “There’s Italian, Russian, German, English—and even a humming chorus with no words,” Wolfe noted. Russian proved especially demanding. “It was a bit of a struggle,” he admitted, “but we found good online resources, and we’re lucky to have a couple of Russian speakers in the chorus who helped everyone along.”
Wolf is also encouraging singers to think theatrically, even in a concert setting. “Choral singers aren’t used to acting,” he said. “They’re used to standing there and singing. I really want them to communicate the drama to the audience. We’re still working on that—but it’s coming.”
The concert closes with Mascagni’s Easter Chorus, featuring organ and soprano soloist Lauren French. “It’s a wonderful way to end,” Wolf said. “And in a concert of opera choruses, the chorus doesn’t get a break—this one really earns its place at the end.”
Looking ahead, Wolfe noted that the Ithaca Community Chorus will celebrate its 50th anniversary this spring with Vaughan Williams’s A Sea Symphony, in collaboration with the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra. “It’s not extremely well known,” he said, “but it should be. The Whitman poetry and the music are just glorious.”
The Ithaca Community Chorus and Chamber Singers present Great Opera Choruses on Saturday, January 17, at 7:30 p.m. at St. Paul’s United Methodist Church, 402 North Aurora Street in Ithaca. More information is available online at https://acithaca.org.