Central Chamber Chorale Holding Spring Concerts this Weekend, March 29th and 30th

Tuesday, March 25th, 2025 -- 3:01 PM

The Central Chamber Chorale will be holding their Spring Concerts this weekend.

I had the opportunity to speak with Ann Stevning-Roe, President of the Central Chamber Chorale Board, and Elizabeth Dahlby, Director of the Chorale and they discussed the concerts in more detail.

Listen to the interview with Ann and Elizabeth here!

Once again, the concerts are being held on Saturday, March 29th at 7:30pm at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in Medford and Sunday, March 30th at 3pm at Christ Lutheran Church in Marshfield. The concerts are open to the public free of charge.

(AI assisted transcription of the interview by Otter.ai):

Ann: "Central Chamber Chorale is a group of volunteer singers and it was started as a PhD thesis by someone who was working at both the campus here and the high school. It was 54 years ago. This is our 53rd season because we had to drop out during the COVID pandemic when things were closed."

"So, this is our 53rd season, but it was started 54 years ago and we have a Volunteer Board of Directors and we have a musical director, which is Elizabeth, and they receive an honorarium, but everybody else is volunteer."

"And they used to perform three concerts in the weekend, including Wisconsin Rapids, but we didn't get back our audience in Rapids very much after we had to shut down."

"And so, we decided to just limit it to two concerts. We always do Marshfield for one of them and then we rotate between Abbotsford and Medford for the other concert in the weekend."

Riley: "Elizabeth, if you could let us know about your concerts coming up this weekend."

Elizabeth: "So, we have seven composers that will be featured. We'll sing music from Bach and William Billings, from Beethoven and Anton Bruckner, also Brahms, Samuel Barber and Leonard Bernstein."

"Each of the composers, I've chosen two pieces for the choirs to sing, and they've been challenging, but they've been good pieces as well. We've been enjoying the time making music. Our accompanists, also, Jamie Jordan, has enjoyed working the pieces as well. So we're looking forward to the presentations."

Riley: "And what made you lean towards the selections that you picked for the spring concerts?"

Elizabeth: "That's kind of funny. We're always trying to find some sort of a theme, I think, when you plan a concert. And what came to mind was composers that start with the letter B."

"Honestly, the phrase that ran through my head was from Bach to Bernstein, and I thought, okay, who do we know between those two composers? And then I just started looking at music and was able to find things that I thought were within the grasp of the group that we have that's working on the selections."

Riley: "And the concert is free and open to the public, correct?"

Elizabeth: "That's correct."

Ann: "We have a grant from the State Arts Board and we also get donations. We send a letter soliciting donations in the fall and we ask for people to make a free will donation at the concert site. But that's how we exist and we've always made our concerts free."

Riley: "Is there anything else, anything else you would like to add about those concerts coming up this weekend?"

Ann: "Yeah, I would say that a lot of the pieces reflect spring weather, and we're also close to Easter, and so, there also is an Easter theme in some of the music. We have some wonderful accompanists."

"We have two flute players who are playing with one of the pieces by Beethoven and we have a cellist who's playing with one of the pieces by Leonard Bernstein, which is interesting because it was originally part of a musical that was one of his only flops on Broadway, had seven performances."

"But the music has lived on and then formatted for choral works and solo works and the song 'Take Care of this House.' 'My House' was actually also performed on one of Julie Andrews albums. So, it's wonderful how something that didn't work on Broadway has lived on through choral and solo productions."

Riley: "Elizabeth, anything else?"

Elizabeth: "I would just mention that we have a soloist on one of our Bruckner pieces as well, tenor, and those pieces are coming together as well. The Beethoven, that's been a fun piece to work on, too. We have a piece from the Mount of Olives."

"He happens to write a letter, and he was struggling with his deafness at the time. And this was an output of that. Anyways, after that, he put this together and one of the selections is the Hallelujah. So, most people think of the Hallelujah chorus, and they think of Handel's Messiah. This happens to be another one."

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