Spring 2021

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Thank you for joining us for our first and final in-person concert of the 2020-2021 year. It is most fitting that our concert is named after Troy Robertson’s piece “In Meeting We Are Blessed.” This was actually the title of our Spring 2020 concert which had to be cancelled before we could perform it. Little did we know how much deeper a meaning this text would hold for us after being unable to meet together for a year. 

In the fall we participated in an online choral enrichment series, Rockingham Lectures and Conversations Series, where we hosted guest speakers, many of whom were composers of works we had prepared or performed before (Brandon Waddles, Marques L. A. Garrett, Reese Norris, and Troy Robertson, to name a few). We also prepared a virtual performance of a new work commissioned by the group, Venite, which I composed. We will premiere the work Venite in live performance on our Winter 2021 concert. 

With the advent of a vaccine, our board decided that we could take on the challenging task this semester of getting back together to rehearsing and performing together in person. Most importantly, we made this decision because we believe in what we do – we need it – choral music changes people. It changes us; it feeds us spiritually. Our hope is that it reaches you in the same way. Choral music creates a framework by which we can engage with the aesthetic, the phenomenological, and be part of something corporate and real that is outside of ourselves. 

In addition to Troy’s piece and two works by Elaine Hagenberg, we will perform Mozart’s Missa Brevis  in d-minor K.65/61a. This work demonstrates Mozart’s prodigious genius, as he completed the work just before his thirteenth birthday. We hope you share in the youthful excitement in this work: Mozart’s only missa brevis in a minor key. 

We are extremely grateful to Fr. Mark Pendelton and Joe DiPalermo of Christ Church for hosting our performance in this glorious space. Thank you for supporting and sustaining what we consider a deeply human and essential art form, choral singing.

Cordially,

Alex T. Favazza, Jr., PhD

Conductor

Music Director

Rockingham Choral Society

 Although this Spring's concert is brought to you as free and largely  funded through the Generous sponsorship of Dr. David Donsker and Riverwoods Exeter, if you would like to help offset the additional costs of bringing you this concert , your donations would be truly appreciated.  You can either go to our patronage page or simply drop what ever donation you wish to make in one of our donation boxes placed in the Lobby. Thank you in advance for supporting the arts.