Choral-olanus?
Thursday, November 13th by scott malia
As the holidays approach (or stampede, depending on how much you are looking forward to them), there will undoubtedly be more entertainments available to the public. While not all of these entertainments will be holiday-themed, they will still be part of an overall mood that seems to go with a season. In other words, the holiday seems to be a time of year that is particularly fruitful for theatre, films, poetry readings, conferences, sporting events, homecomings, reunions and other forms of leisure. In short, you can pretty much pick your mode of merry-making and go to town.
One type of entertainment ideally suited to the holidays is the choral concert. Even if the concert isn’t dusting off holiday-themed music, it does serve as entertainment for the holiday seasons. The ASTER Women’s Chamber Choir is taking their fall concert in a different direction, setting the words of Shakespeare to music. The program, entitled
“Shakespeare: Songs, Sonnets and Soliloquies,” features some of The Bard’s most famous words set to music by a variety of composers. The concert includes some solo performance amidst the choral ones. Monologues from several plays have been set to music and the choir director noted that part of the fun in using Shakespearean material was that the singers get to play characters (one of the highlights of the production finds the chorus embodying the witches from Macbeth). For Shakespeare fans, the concert allows them to hear actual music paired with words and phrases with a musicality all their own.
