MIDDLEBURY — The St. Lawrence University Laurentian Singers will kick off their spring break tour to Cleveland, Detroit and Toronto with a concert at 4 p.m. on Saturday, March 5, at the Congregational Church of Middlebury. The concert is free and open to the public.
Senior Laurentian singer and soprano soloist Carlie Wright hails from Middlebury and will sing the traditional songs of St. Lawrence along with invited alumni.
The focus of the singers’ tour will be visiting high schools, sharing their music and connecting with students. In light of this and in celebration of its long history, the choral group will perform a selection of traditional choral fare.
Sacred music from various traditions such as Lutheran Germany (Johann Sebastian Bach), Orthodox Russia (Pavel Grigorievich Chesnokov) and contemporary America (Morten Johannes Lauridsen) will open the program. The opening will be followed by a set of classic British folk songs, including “Quick! We Have but a Second,” “Londonderry Air” (“Oh, Danny Boy”), “I Love my Love,” “Skye Boat Song” and “Drunken Sailor.”
The choral group will then perform popular songs from the 1960s, including “Under the Boardwalk,” “Heat Wave” and “Can’t Help Falling in Love.” The concert will close with a set of favorite traditional spirituals that includes “Elijah Rock,” “Daniel, Daniel,” “My Lord, What a Morning” and “Great Day.”
The Laurentian Singers, a select coeducational choir of 28 undergraduate singers, celebrates its 70th anniversary this year, continuing a tradition of choral excellence at St. Lawrence University. The group has won wide acclaim since its founding in 1946, and, in addition to their many performances on campus and in the community, the ensemble has toured extensively. In recent years, they have performed in New Orleans, Trinidad and Tobago, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, France, New York, Boston and Central Europe, singing for enthusiastic, packed audiences and meeting with other choirs.
Their wide-ranging repertoire, drawn from music of many styles and countries, reflects the spirit of the liberal arts experience at St. Lawrence University. The Laurentian Singers includes undergraduate students who represent a wide variety of academic majors and interests.
For more information, visit www.stlawu.edu/music.