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8.2.2010 The Chanticleer returns to the National Philharmonic Hall to present the flowering seasons as the stages of life
The GRAMMY Award-winning male vocal ensemble from San Francisco continues its 32nd Season of 2009-10, during which more than 100 concerts are planned in 21 of the United States and 12 foreign countries, including appearances at Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles, New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, Amsterdam 's Concertgebouw, Vienna's Musikverein, Prague's Rudolfinum and Expo 2010 in Shanghai. For several seasons in a row Chanticleer has included Lithuania in their tour itineraries. On February 10th, the ensemble will guest appear at the National Philharmonic Hall in Vilnius, at 7 pm.
Chanticleer is the only independent full-time classical vocal ensemble in the United States, known around the world as “an orchestra of voices” for the seamless blend of its twelve male voices ranging from countertenor to bass and its original interpretations of vocal literature, from Renaissance to jazz, from avant-garde and to gospel, folk, pop standards and venturesome new music.
“Chanticleer fascinates and enthralls for much the same reason a fine chocolate or a Rolls Royce does: through luxurious perfection” (Los Angeles Times).
While most of Chanticleer's work is done a cappella, the group has collaborated on a number of unusual projects, including a fully-staged opera, recordings of jazz standards with the Don Haas Trio, performances with Japanese dancers Eiko and Koma, and reconstructions of early vocal and instrumental repertory. For instance, in collaboration with acknowledged Mexican Baroque musical authority Professor Craig Russell, Chanticleer has recorded two albums (“Mexican Baroque” in 1994 and “Matins for the Virgin of Guadeloupe” in 1998) of religious works by two Mexican composers of the Baroque period, Manuel de Zumaya and Ignácio de Jerusalem, and extended this repertory by presenting a new programme “El Camino Real” in 2008, released as a CD and DVD album “Mission Road” (Warner Classics).
The programme “In Time Of...” that the Chanticleer ensemble brings this time to Vilnius presents a selection of vocal compositions from its vast repertoire, encompassing musical works from seven centuries and diverse musical cultures – from the Gregorian chant and Renaissance music of the 15th-16th centuries (including that composed by Guillaume Dufay, Clément Janequin, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Sethus Calvisius and Orlando Gibbons) to the contemporary art music of the 20th and 21st centuries (Jean Yves Daniel-Lesur, György Ligeti, Chen Yi, Steven Sametz, Michael McGlynn, Mason Bates) to folk and popular songs and spirituals.
This programme is named after a piece by American composer Steven Sametz, which gave the idea for the entire selection of music from various epochs, reflecting various stages of life and states of mind. Sametz’s composition is set to the poem in time of lilacs by e.e.cummings, in which he describes the order in which flowers blossom, imagining it as a metaphor for the passage of life and portraying daffodils as growing infants, lilacs as dreaming adolescents and roses as adults amazed that paradise can occasionally surprise us with flashes that astound the mundane world.
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