Chor Leoni shows off snippets from Asian trip
If you’re the kind of person who agonizes over what to take on a weekend vacation, spare a thought for Erick Lichte, who’s currently packing for 48. That’s how many Chor Leoni singers will soon be jetting off to Singapore and Bali to take part in a pair of high-profile international choral competitions. And while Lichte isn’t responsible for making sure that they’ve all brought their phone chargers, he does have to ensure that they’re singing the best of their repertoire at the peak of their abilities.
“I’ve just been trying to do this jigsaw puzzle of what’s going to show the choir off, and what’s going to make us really, really happy,” Chor Leoni’s artistic director tells the Straight from his Kitsilano home. “So many people think that, for my job, it’s ‘Well, Erick picks the music he wants to do.’ And that couldn’t be further from the truth. I’m always thinking about who Chor Leoni is, what’s going to be great for them, what are maybe some skills that we need to develop and what sort of pieces would help us develop those skills, what’s going to be good for the audience. And what are the venues that we’re going to be singing in? Is it a church? Is it a concert hall? Is it a Bard on the Beach tent? These are the sorts of things that come into play.
“In some ways we’re showing what male choirs can do,” Lichte continues, noting that his singers will often be competing in the “equal voice” category, which puts Chor Leoni up against children’s choirs and all-female ensembles. “But then we’re also ambassadors for Canada, so we want to be presenting music that is near and dear to our heart.”
Local audiences can get a taste of what he means while celebrating Chor Leoni’s 25th anniversary this weekend. Bookending the program will be a choral adaptation of the classic French-canadian folk song “Un Canadien Errant” and a song-anddance version of Bollywood soundtrack artist A.R. Rahman’s “Wedding Qawwali”. Further emphasizing Canada’s cultural diversity will be the choir’s take on Oji-cree composer Corey Payette’s “Gimikwenden Ina”, from his musical Children of God. And Chor Leoni will also get a chance to show off the winner of its 2018 Canadian Choral Composition Competition, as judged by composers Jocelyn Morlock and Rodney Sharman and entrepreneur James Carter.
“It’s one of the stronger pieces that has come my way in a really long time,” Lichte says of Marie-claire Saindon’s “Mer Calme”. “It’s a bit of a tone poem: she has set this French romantic poem that’s ostensibly about the sea.… the idea is that this person is looking out over the sea and seeing how calm it is, and wishing that their soul could be as tranquil as the sea. It’s so evocative; it’s one of those pieces that you don’t even have to understand the French to get. And we’re pairing that with one of the competition pieces that we’re doing in Asia; it’s a work by Veljo Tormis [Incantatio Maris Aestuosi] commemorating the sinking of the Estonia, that ferry liner that went down in the Baltic in the 1990s. So we’ll have this lovely, evocative sea set.
“I don’t necessarily always believe in competition in music,” he adds, “but it does have this wonderful effect of making us work as hard as we possibly can, and I think the audience will be in for some real treats.”
WORLD WITHOUT US
Written by Alexander Devriendt, Karolien De Bleser, Valentijn Dhaenens, and Joeri Smet. Directed by Alexander Devriendt. At the Cultch’s Historic Theatre on Thursday, April 19. Continues until April 29
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