Alice Parker and ChoralQuest

Synopsis

Boston-born American composer Alice Parker is a respected figure in the world of choral music. She studied with the legendary choral conductor Robert Shaw and collaborated with him in a series of folk-song arrangements that are performed by choruses all over the world.

Parker was approached by the American Composers Forum to write a new work for their “Choral Quest” series specially designed for middle school children. Parker was intrigued by the challenge, realizing that many scores written for elementary schools would be too easy for middle schoolers, but works written for high school choirs might be too difficult. Also, parts written for middle school boys would have to accommodate voices in the process of changing from treble to tenor, baritone, and bass.

Parker collaborated with students from the Amherst Regional Middle School Choir in her home state, and found some Native American texts that intrigued her, including one that began “What I am, I must become.” That text seemed perfect, since, as Parker put it, “Children that age have so much ‘becoming’ to do. … What they don’t realize — yet — is that is true for all of us, all of our lives!”

That text became the first of a three-part suite entitled “Dancing Songs,” premiered by the Amherst Regional Middle School Choir and their director David Ranen on today’s date in 2011.

Music Played in Today's Program

Alice Parker (b. 1925) –Dancing Songs (Minnesota Boy Choir) ChoralQuest promotional CD

On This Day

Births

• 1897 - Hungarian born American conductor and occasional composer/arranger George Szell, in Budapest; He was led the Cleveland Orchestra from 1946 until the time of his death in 1970;

Deaths

• 1863 - Austrian composer Franz Xaver Gruber, age 75, in Hallen (near Salzburg); He composed the famous Christmas Carol, “Silent Night” (Stille Nacht), in 1818, while serving as a church organist and schoolmaster in Oberndorf;

Premieres

• 1896 - Hugo Wolf: opera "Der Corregidor" (The Governor) (1st version) in Mannheim at the Nationaltheater;

• 1920 - Gershwin: musical revue, "George White's Scandals of 1920," at the Globe Theater in New York City;

• 1922 - American premiere of Vaughan Williams: "Pastoral" Symphony (no.3), at the Litchfield County Choral Festival in Norfolk, Conn., with the composer conducting.; The world premiere had taken place in London on Jan. 26, 1922;

• 1927 - Prokofiev: ballet, "Pas d'Acier," in Paris, by the Ballet Russe;

• 1933 - Weill: "The Seven Deadly Sins of the Bourgeoisie," in Paris; text by Bertolt Brecht;

• 1945 - Britten: opera "Peter Grimes," in London at Sadler's Wells Theater;

• 1951 - Dutilleux: Symphony No. 1, in Paris;

• 1972 - Copland: "Three Latin American Sketches," at Philharmonic Hall (now Avery Fisher Hall) in New York City, by New York Philharmonic conducted by André Kostelanetz;

• 1984 - Crumb: "A Haunted Landscape," by the New York Philharmonic, Arthur Weisberg conducting.