Family Weekend Features Performances by Four Choirs

Rider University’s Family Weekend, which is November 5 through 7, features plenty of activities and events for students and their families on the Lawrenceville and Westminster campuses. Some highlights will be three choral concerts featuring four ensembles: the Rider University Chorale, Westminster Chapel Choir, Westminster Schola Cantorum and Westminster Williamson Voices.
               
Westminster Schola Cantorum and Westminster Williamson Voices will present a concert titled “Gloria!” in Bristol Chapel on the Westminster Choir College campus in Princeton at 8 p.m. The concert will include performances of Poulenc’s Gloria, Gibbons’ Hosanna to the Son of David, Palestrina’s Missa Papae Marcelli and Whitbourn’s Winter's Wait. A highlight will be the world premiere of Requiem Canticorum for choir, organ and soprano saxophone, written by James Whitbourn for the Westminster Williamson Voices.
               
Westminster Schola Cantorum is composed of all second-year students at Westminster Choir College.  Members of Westminstrer Williamson Voices are selected by audition.  Conductor James Jordan, widely acknowledged as one of the most influential conductors in America, has written and produced more than 40 books, recordings and DVD’s. Admission to the concert is $20 for adults and $15 for students and seniors.  Rider University students, faculty and staff may receive one free ticket.  Tickets can be purchased by calling the box office at 609-921-2663 or by visiting www.rider.edu/arts.

On Saturday, Nov. 6, the Rider University Chorale will present its debut performance of the season at 2 p.m. in Gill Chapel on the Lawrenceville campus. This concert will be the ensemble’s first performance under the direction of Sun Min Lee. Before being appointed conductor of the Rider University Chorale, she served for six years as a member of the Choral Conducting faculty at Westminster Choir College, where she conducted the Westminster Chapel Choir, which made its Carnegie Hall debut last season.  The Rider University Chorale is open to all students by audtion.  Admission to this performance is free.

Also on November  6, Westminster Chapel Choir will perform a concert titled “Resound, O Voices!” at 7:30 p.m. in the Princeton Regional Schools Performing Arts Center at Princeton High School. The choir will perform works by J.S. Bach, Lajos Bárdos and Morten Lauridsen. This performance will be the first of the season for the Choir and for its new conductor Amanda Quist, who is in her first year on the faculty at Westminster Choir College. Additionally, upper-class students will perform the sextet from the third act of Mozart’s Le Nozze de Figaro (The Marriage of Figaro) and the quartet from the first act of Mozart’s  Don Giovanni.      .

Founded in 1949, the Westminster Chapel Choir takes its name from Westminster’s rich history of leadership in the field of sacred music.  The ensemble has evolved over the years, and today its repertoire includes both sacred and secular works.  It is composed of students in their first year of study at Westminster Choir College.  Conductor Amanada Quist was director of choral activities at San Jose State University before joining the Westminster Choir College faculty this fall.  Admission to this event is free. The entrance to the Princeton Regional Schools Performing Arts Center at Princeton High School is located on Walnut Lane across from the Westminster Choir College campus.