The OCC Chamber Singers will join forces with the College of the Sequoias (COS) Chamber Singers, visiting from Visalia, for a special performance of Francis Poulenc’s celebrated Gloria. The concert will take place on Saturday, May 9, at 7:30 p.m. in the Robert B. Moore Theatre. Brilliant, jazzy, haunting, and mesmerizing by turns, Poulenc’s Gloria has captivated audiences since its composition in 1959.
The Chamber Singers, directed by Eliza Rubenstein, is the most elite ensemble in OCC’s music department, and the COS Chamber Singers, directed by John Sorber, bring an equally distinguished reputation and outstanding level of achievement to this collaboration. The two ensembles, featuring more than 60 singers combined, will be joined by OCC faculty member Janelle Kim on the piano and soprano soloist Andrea Zomorodian, a veteran of the concert stage and Hollywood film scores.
The concert will open with Mack Wilberg’s "Fantasy on Themes from Bizet’s Carmen," featuring four OCC music faculty pianists performing on two pianos. Audience members will enjoy some of the most popular and catchy tunes in operatic history, given new life in Wilberg’s offbeat and virtuosic setting.
"Francis Poulenc was probably the greatest choral composer of the 20th century, and his Gloria is both a classic and an audience pleaser,” says Rubenstein. “Its dramatic twists and turns are celebratory, pensive, humorous, mysterious, and much more, and we know concertgoers will love the music and appreciate this collaboration!"
Tickets are $10 and can be purchased online at the OCC Tickets website.