Music At Pine Street (MAPS)

2009 – 2010

We are pleased to present the 2009 – 2010 season of Music at Pine Street events. We hope that you will find inspiration and joy in the offerings we have planned for the coming season.

From the superb, internationally acclaimed artistry of the Eaken Trio to world class organ playing by Alan Morrison, professor of organ at the Curtis Institute to masterworks of the choral literature presented by our own distinguished Choir and Chamber Singers, we believe we have planned a season that will bring a sense of hope to these difficult times.

The brilliant and internationally renowned Eaken Piano Trio whose home is here in Central Pennsylvania opens the season for the third consecutive year with their glorious music for violin, cello and piano.

Each of the trio members is a concert soloist in his or her own right, but together they become more than the sum of their parts! They have recorded for major labels and appeared in such venues as Carnegie Hall and Town Hall in New York and across Europe and Asia. They present some of the great classic trio literature for the opening of the 2009 – 2010 concert season here at Pine Street.

The Chamber Singers of Pine Street Church have enjoyed singing the office of Choral Evensong for the past eleven years. We have marked various special dates in the church year, and occasionally, nothing special. But the service is always sung with passion and sensitivity to the beauty of the English liturgy and the vast repertoire created for this service.

For 2009, we celebrate the Feast of All Saints with service music by Herbert Murrill in D and Preces and Responses by our own Thomas Clark-Jones. Also Ernest Bullock’s Give Us the Wings of Faith and the Evening Hymn of Balfour Gardiner.

Admission is free

Each Advent season, the Choir of Pine Street Church is called upon to make a special presentation of a great masterwork as the proclamation of the Word in worship.

This year, on the Second Sunday of Advent, we will present one of Francis Poulenc’s most brilliant works … the GLORIA for Choir and soprano soloist. The work was written between May and December of 1959 and established the composer as a major creator of sacred music. Although essentially a concert work, its beautiful setting of the text of the Gloria of the Mass makes it a perfect worship piece. Soaring in its conception, it makes use of various styles, not the least of which is American jazz.

The Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols is considered by many the most beautiful service in English-speaking Christendom. Born of humble beginnings in 1908 when the Bishop of Truro laid out its basic outline for use as a simple Christmas Eve service and later moved to the Chapel of King’s College, Cambridge when the Bishop became Dean of Kings, it has grown into a service adorned with the greatest choral music ever written and broadcast around the world on the BBC. Churches around the world have grown to love the service as it was adapted by choirmasters for their own use. This year, works of David Willcocks, John Rutter, Robert Lehman, Healey Willan and others are featured.

Following the Festival, you are invited to join us for dinner in McCormick Hall. Details of the dinner will be available separately as Christmas draws near. Plan now to attend with your entire family. Merry Christmas!

12 February 2010
Friday evening at seven-thirty p.m.

Thomas Clark-Jones celebrates more than twelve years as Organist- Choirmaster of Pine Street Church with an organ recital on Pine Street’s superb Skinner-Moller organ. Nineteen years after its last renovation in 1991, it remains the premier recital instrument in Central Pennsylvania.

For this recital, Mr. Clark-Jones has chosen to feature music of Cèsar Franck (1822–1890). Esteemed second only to the immortal J.S. Bach as the quintessential composer for the organ, Franck’s music explores every possible color and expressive feature of the pipe organ. Music includes the Pastorale, Prière, Final as well as his final work, the Three Chorales. Spectacular music on a spectacular instrument. An evening not to be missed.

Suggested donation is $10.00 at the door

DOWNTOWN DAILY BREAD BENEFIT

John Rutter: When Icicles Hang
John Rutter: FanciesThe Chamber Singers
Thomas Clark-Jones, conductor, pianist
Selected Piano Music
Anne Guenin, pianist

The Chamber Singers of Pine Street Church sing two sets of John Rutter’s charming settings of secular poetry. The now renowned composer chooses love lyrics for Fancies and songs of winter for the Icicles cycle. All bear the un-mistakable imprint of the composer’s delightful style which combines superbly crafted music in an accessible idiom that charms all who hear.

In addition, Anne Guenin presents some of her favorite works for solo piano. A graduate of the University of Michigan School of Music, she is an accomplished virtuoso, well known in central Pennsylvania and always willing to share her significant talents with the music program of Pine Street Church.

A free-will offering for D.D.B. will be received!

9 April 2010
Friday evening at seven-thirty p.m.

After a season’s hiatus, the Broadway cabaret is back with great songs from the Broadway stage and the sound stages of Hollywood, and even a little foray into the world of TV music and musicals.

Join the Choir, soloists and friends in another evening of truly American music. Nothing thrills like a Broadway show. And so many movies have memorable sound-tracks that we just can’t resist having another go at it!

The evening will feature the best of both coasts as you sit around the tables in McCormick Hall and enjoy some gourmet coffee and desserts. This has been a sell-out every time we’ve done it … so get your tickets early. This will be a ticketed event with tickets available at the CHAMPS table on March 7.

This year’s show will be a benefit the Youth Mission Trip to Chicago, to take place in the summer of 2010. So come, enjoy a fine evening of show tunes and help our youth help others and grow in faith.

Tickets in advance only … $25.00

23 April 2010
Friday at seven-thirty p.m

At age thirty-three, Alan Morrison became the Head of the Organ Department at the renowned Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, holding the Haas Charitable Trust Chair in Organ Studies. In this post he follows such luminaries as John Weaver and the legendary Alexander McCurdy. He is College Organist at Ursinus College in Collegeville and an Adjunct Professor of Organ at Westminster Choir College.

Mr. Morrison is a graduate of both the Curtis Institute and the Juilliard School receiving degrees in both piano and organ. His concerts have taken him to every major venue in the United States and Canada, including Meyerson Symphony Hall in Dallas; The National Cathedral in Washington as well as the Wanamaker Organ and the new Fred J. Cooper Memorial Organ at the Kimmel Center in Philadelphia. He is one of the finest organists playing today, and you will not want to miss this spectacular evening of organ music!

Suggested donation $10.00 at the door.

15 May 2010
Friday at seven-thirty p.m.

The Chamber Singers lead us in Choral Evensong in the English tradition as we celebrate Ascension Day. The service music is the glorious "Collegium Regale" of Herbert Howells, written for King’s College, Cambridge.

Following the service, the choir sings Benjamin Britten’s moving cantata, "Rejoice in the Lamb" to texts of Christopher Smart.

A free will offering is received.

5 June 2010
Saturday evening at eight
at Market Square Church

MUSIC OF BOB CHILCOTT

The choirs of Pine Street Church and Market Square Church meet in a long-awaited joint concert which will take place in the Sanctuary at Market Square.

Distinguished British composer, Bob Chilcott, whose music has moved thousands of faithful listeners to serious choral music over the past decade will be the guest artist in a U.S. premier of an original choral work. Chilcott started his musical career at King’s College, Cambridge as a chorister and later a choral scholar. He was a member of the distinguished ensemble "The King’s Singers" for a number of years before setting off in the late 1990’s to make his living as a composer. In that time he has written many anthems and larger works for choir, organ and orchestra … all met with critical acclaim in Britain and across Europe and America.