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RICHARD EATON SINGERS

Founded in 1951 by Richard S. Eaton, Edmonton’s premier symphonic choir, Richard Eaton Singers (RES), has played a leading role in the cultural community of the city for over seven decades. Although unable to celebrate their seventieth anniversary during Covid, RES has always been dedicated to the enjoyment, study and performance of great choral music to an international standard of excellence, and to fostering the appreciation and future of this music. RES performances have included Edmonton premieres of many choral masterpieces such as Haydn’s Creation, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Schubert’s Mass No 5 in A-Flat, Vaughan Williams’s The Sea Symphony, as well as many shorter works for accompanied and unaccompanied choir. The choir has commissioned and produced premiere performances by Canadian composers, including Allan Bevan’s No Mortal Business and Last Light Above the World, as well as works by John Estacio, Stephanie Martin, Imant Raminsh and Mark Sirett. They have also participated in several ESO premieres of Canadian works, including Malcolm Forsyth’s A Ballad of Canada. The choir has traveled extensively across Canada, to the Netherlands, Britain, and Germany, and has participated in choir exchanges, including with the Calgary Philharmonic Choir and Vancouver Bach Choir. RES regularly performs with other Edmonton area choirs, most recently with Kappella Kyrie in a fundraiser concert in support of Ukrainian families who relocated to Edmonton during the war. Often partnering with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, RES has created many memorable choral events in our city, including the performance of Mahler’s Symphony of a Thousand to celebrate the opening of the Francis Winspear Centre for Music. In recent years RES has joined forces with the Alberta Baroque Ensemble to perform a number of masterpieces from the Baroque and Classical periods. The 2023-24 season includes Handel’s Messiah with the ESO on December 8-9 and an intermission-free concert of Mozart’s incredible Mass in C Minor on May 12, 2024.

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NOVEMBER 10, 2023

ARTISTS

Artistic Director Timothy Shantz is a conductor, collaborator, tenor soloist, teacher and life-long dreamer. He is the Founder and Artistic Director of Calgary’s professional choir, Luminous Voices, and the Director of Choral Activities at the University of Alberta’s Department of Music. The Calgary Philharmonic Chorus and Spiritus Chamber Choir flourished during his tenure between 2008-2020. As a conductor, he is recognized for the breadth of his work. Luminous Voices was nominated for a JUNO Award in 2020 for Peter-Anthony Togni’s Sea Dreams. Both Luminous Voices and Spiritus Chamber Choir earned national choral awards, including Outstanding Choral Recording, and the Healey Willan Grand Prize for Choirs. In 2021, he was honoured to receive the Richard S. Eaton Award of Distinction from Choir Alberta in recognition of exemplary service to choral music in the province of Alberta. Timothy holds a Doctor of Music degree in Choral Conducting from Indiana University Jacobs School of Music. His research involved extensive interviews with Sir James MacMillan and an analysis of his unaccompanied choral work Sun-Dogs. He is also a graduate of the University of Alberta’s Choral Conducting program (M.Mus 1999), and earned a degree in piano performance from Wilfrid Laurier University (Hon. B.Mus 1995). Conducting instructors include John Poole, Jan Harrington, Carmen Tellez, Frieder Bernius, Jon Washburn, Leonard Ratzlaff, Debra Cairns and Noel Edison.

Conductor Emeritus Leonard Ratzlaff joined the Department of Music at University of Alberta in 1981, and at the same time was appointed the Music Director of Richard Eaton Singers, which position he held for 42 years. In addition to conducting and preparing Richard Eaton Singers in many of the great symphonic/choral masterworks, Leonard has also conducted numerous premieres of RES commissions by Canadian composers, and under his direction choirs have toured both nationally and internationally. A native of Alberta, Leonard took his music training in BC and Manitoba, and his doctoral studies in conducting at the University of Iowa, where his dissertation on the Te Deum of Anton Bruckner was awarded the American Choral Director Association’s Julius Herford Dissertation Prize. Recently retired from the University of Alberta, he was instrumental in developing the most established graduate program in choral conducting in Canada. He has directed the UofA Madrigal Singers to successes in several national and international competitions, producing 5 CD recordings, two of which earned them the National Choral Award. Leonard makes frequent appearances across Canada as a guest conductor, clinician and bass soloist. A past conductor of the National Youth Choir of Canada, he has undertaken the coordination of a project to provide a sound file database for Choral Canada of the NYC’s performances from its inception in 1984 to the present. He has been inducted into the Order of Canada and the Alberta Order of Excellence, and is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada

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NOVEMBER 10, 2023

ARTISTS

Leanne Regehr is a versatile and sensitive pianist who is widely recognized for her intuitive ability to collaborate with other musicians across an extensive range of repertoire. She is a keyboardist with the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, and has performed with the Chamber Orchestra of Edmonton, Pro Coro Canada, Da Camera Singers, Luminous Voices, the Okanagan Symphony Orchestra, and the Academy Concert Series in Toronto. Leanne has been engaged as a répétiteur with Shreveport Opera, Mercury Opera, and Edmonton Opera and her dedication to the development of young singers has been shown through her work as a faculty member with Opera NUOVA, as a Coaching Fellow at the Aspen Music Festival and most recently with the Ukrainian Art Song Project’s Summer Institute in Toronto. Leanne completed her Doctor of Music in Piano Performance at Northwestern University and explored further studies at the Banff School of Fine Arts, the Universitat Mozarteum in Salzburg. She serves as piano instructor at The King’s University and has enjoyed playing the masterworks of the choral repertoire during her twenty seasons as accompanist with the Richard Eaton Singers in Edmonton, where she freelances as a soloist, vocal coach, recital partner, and adjudicator.

After early studies in London, organist Jeremy Spurgeon won scholarships to study both piano accompaniment and organ at the Royal Northern College of Music, Manchester, and later studied organ at the Geneva Conservatoire where he gained the Premier Prix de la Classe de Virtuosite. His teachers have been Eileen Sullivan, Eric Pask, Lorna Sergeant, Ronald Frost, Eric Chadwick, Lionel Rogg and Dame Gillian Weir. In 1980, Jeremy took up the position as director of music at All Saints’ Anglican Cathedral in Edmonton, Alberta. Since then, he has appeared in concert with many ensembles, singers and instrumentalists in Canada, the United States and Europe.

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NOVEMBER 10, 2023

ARTISTS

Assistant Conductor, Jodi Penner has performed extensively in opera, musical theatre and solo recitals as well as BBC radio dramas and TV as well as two solo albums. She is an accomplished soloist and actor with many performing credits around the world including The United States, Canada, Scotland, Russia, Italy, Austria, and Bolivia. Originally from California, Jodi finished her MMus in voice at the University of Alberta in 2011 and is currently working on her Doctorate of Music in Choral Conducting and Voice Performance at the University of Alberta under Timothy Shantz and John Tessier. She has sung the National Anthem for the Giants in 1992, 1993, soloist with Redwood Symphony in California and performed roles with Opera Roanoke, Opera festival di Roma, Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Rosebud Theatre. Jodi has also sung with Canadian Chamber Choir, Edmonton Opera Chorus, I Coristi, Pro Coro, Entrecantos, Orquesta Filarmónica de Santa Cruz de la Sierra, Trio Internaciónal and Bachfest in Bolivia. She is an active soprano soloist as well as making guest conducting appearances with Edmonton Youth Choirs and as emerging conductor with Pro Coro Canada. Jodi teaches voice privately as a member of the National Association of Teachers of Singing and is an invited clinician for many local Alberta music festivals. Jodi is the recipient of the Johann Strauss Award for study in Austria as well as the Beryl Barnes Award, Carol Mallette Award, John and Logie Drew Graduate Scholarship in Choral Conducting, Rosemary Holsworth Graduate Scholarship in Music and Alberta Graduate Excellence Scholarship.

Ergon Brass is the collective name for an ensemble which performs in Edmonton, usually in collaboration with choir and/or organ. Much of the repertoire comes via the famous Philip Jones Brass Ensemble (active 1950’s-80’s), who blazed a trail in the world of brass. Ergon Brass has performed with RES in the past, and can be heard on the choir’s recording, In Praise of Music. Trumpets: Miles Thomsen, Russell Whitehead, Kevin Yue, Dean McNeil Trombones: Alden Lowrey, Ivan Mast, Ted Huck (bass trombone) Tuba: Scott Whetham

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NOVEMBER 10, 2023

PROGRAM ORDER

REMEMBER Ergon Brass Leanne Regehr, P I ANO Jeremy Spurgeon, O RGAN

Friday November 10, 2023 Winspear Centre

PROGRAM Jubilate Deo

Ergon Brass Jeremey Spurgeon, organ

Cantus Missae, Op. 109, Kyrie Ave Maria Hail, gladdening light Vast Ocean of Light

Jeremy Spurgeon, organ

Giovanni Gabrieli (1554/57-1612)

Josef Rheinberger (1839-1901) Anton Bruckner (1824-1896) Charles Wood (1866-1926) Jonathan Dove (b. 1959)

A Silence Haunts Me

Jake Runestad (b. 1986) Leanne Regehr, piano

INTERMISSION In Flanders Fields Last Post 2 minutes of silence Rouse (Reveille)

Christine Donkin* (b. 1976)

Russell Whitehead

branche

John Estacio* (b. 1966)

Leanne Regehr, piano

Magnificat

Jodi Penner, soprano Jeremy Spurgeon, organ

Ruth Watson Henderson* (b. 1932)

Suite from the Royal Brass Music of King James I I - Almande (poco Allegro) II - Almande (Lento) III - Almande (Allegro)

attributed Nicholas Guy Giles Farnaby Anon. Ergon brass

The Road Home

Stephen Paulus (1949-2014)

Janet Smith, soprano

Nothing Gold Can Stay Unclouded Day I Was Glad

Stephanie Martin* (b. 1962) arr. by Shawn Kirchner Hubert Parry (1848-1918)

Ergon brass Jeremy Spurgeon, organ

How can I keep from singing?

arr. by Sarah Quartel*

Brenda Enns, soprano

* indicates Canadian composer

REMEMBER

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

PROGRAM NOTES Dr. Leonard Ratzlaff has served as Music Director of the Richard Eaton Singers for more than four decades. Over those decades, the choir has presented countless premieres for Edmonton audiences of both old and new works. In his final year as Music Director, he was forced to take a step back for health reasons - a real disappointment after patiently waiting for the restrictions of COVID to subside. It was a bittersweet ending to the 2022-2023 season as the choir performed Mendelssohn’s “Elijah” with Len sitting in the wings as an eager listener. Naturally, it seemed fitting to invite Len to conduct the choir, as soon as his health allowed. While this performance does not replace what was lost in the past couple of years, we are so pleased to take this opportunity to honour Len for his dedication to the Richard Eaton Singers and to choral music in Edmonton for the past many years. Len and I collaborated on tonight’s program, which features countless works that the choir has performed over the decades and composers that are dear to Len’s heart. Many of the selections reflect a celebratory style and contain Len’s signature dramatic qualities. Both unaccompanied and accompanied works are featured, from Gabrieli to the German Romantic period, to Canadian composers such as Ruth Watson Henderson and John Estacio. It is a treat for us to feature John Estacio’s branche, having been commissioned by a member of the choir, Brian Haliburton, in loving memory of Frieda H. Haliburton. The work also features poetry by Ted Blodgett, former singer and Poet Laureate for the City of Edmonton in 2017. Len also selected music that features our incredible accompanist, Leanne Regehr, as well as frequent collaborator and organist extraordinaire, Jeremy Spurgeon. There are two key works that I was keen to include on this program. The first, by Jonathan Dove, is imaginative, hopeful and celestial, featuring a colourful and dazzling organ part. The second is a dramatic and even theatrical work based on words from Beethoven’s very personal Heiligenstadt Testament and reworked into poetry by Todd Boss. The work ends in silence. The Ergon brass ensemble makes a wonderful addition to the program and is featured on both ends of the program as well as on their own in the 2nd half in a set of pieces from the 1600’s. Our program concludes with a set of music that exudes Len’s positive spirit and generosity, beautifully reflecting his appreciation for the role that the Richard Eaton Singers has played in his life as well as the importance of choral music in our community. It is an honour to be the new Artistic Director of Richard Eaton Singers and to share this program with Leonard Ratzlaff as well as our Assistant Conductor for the 2023-2024 season, Jodi Penner. —Dr Timothy Shantz

REMEMBER

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

TEXT AND TRANSLATIONS

J U B I L AT E D E O

O be joyful in the Lord, all ye lands; For they shall be blessed who fear the Lord. The God of Israel, may He join you And may He be with you May He send you help from His holy place and from Zion. May the Lord bless you out of Zion, The Lord who made heaven and earth. Serve the Lord with gladness!

Jubilate Deo, omnis terra; Quia sic benedicetur homo qui timet Dominum. Deus Israel conjungat vos et ipse sit vobiscum, mittat vobis, Auxilium de sancto et de Sion tuetur vos, Benedicat vobis Dominus et Sion Qui fecit coelum et terram. Servite Domino in laetitia. CA N T U S M I S SA E : K Y R I E

Lord, have mercy. Christ, have mercy. Lord, have mercy.

Kyrie eleison Christe eleison Kyrie eleison AV E M A R I A

Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou amongst women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, Holy Mary, pray for us now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum; Benedicta tu in mulieribus. Et benedictus fructus ventris tui Jesus. Sancta Maria, mater Dei. Ora pro nobis peccatoribus. Nunc et in hora mortis nostrae, Sancta Maria, ora pro nobis. Amen. HAIL, GLADDENING LIGHT

Hail! gladdening Light, of His pure glory poured Who is the immortal Father, heavenly, blest. Holiest of Holies—Jesu Christ our Lord! Now we are come to the Sun’s hour of rest; The lights of evening round us shine; We hymn the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit divine!

Worthiest art thou at all times to be sung With undefiled tongue, Son of our God, giver of life, alone: Therefore in all the world thy glories, Lord, they own. Amen. Early Christian hymn, tr. John Keble

VAS T O C E A N O F L I G H T

Vast Ocean of light, whose rayes surround The Universe, who know’st nor ebb, nor shore, Who lend’st the Sun his sparkling drop, to store With overflowing beams Heav’n, ayer, ground, Whose depths beneath the Centre none can sound,

Whose heights ‘bove heav’n, and thoughts so lofty soar, Whose breadth no feet, no lines, no chains, no eyes survey, Whose length no thoughts can reach, no worlds can bound, What cloud can mask thy face? where can thy ray Find an Eclipse? what night can hide Eternal Day? Phineas Fletcher

REMEMBER

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

TEXT AND TRANSLATIONS

A S I L E N C E H AU N T S M E

TEXT BY TOD D B OS S , A DA P TE D FRO M A L E T T E R ( H E I L I G E N STADT T E STAM E N T ) BY LU DWI G VAN BE E T H OVE N

Hear me, brothers I’ve a confession painful to make. Six years I have endured a curse that deepens every day. They say that soon I’ll cease to hear the very music of my soul. What should be the sense most perfect in me fails me, shames me, taunts me. A silence haunts me. They ask me Do you hear the shepherd singing far-off soft? - Do you hear a distant fluting dancing joyously aloft? - No. - I think so? - No. – I think so? - No. God, am I Prometheus? - exiled in chains for gifting humankind

my fire? Take my feeling take my sight - take my wings midflight but let me hear the searing roar of air before I score the ground! Why? — Silence is God’s reply - and so I beg me take my life when lo - I hear a grace and feel a ringing in me after all - so now as leaves of autumn fall, I make my mark and sign my name and turn again to touch my flame of music to the world, a broken man, as best I can, As ever, Faithfully yours, (A bell? - A bell?) Hear me, and be well. Todd Boss

IN FLANDERS FIELDS

In Flanders fields the poppies blow Between the crosses, row on row, That mark our place; and in the sky The larks, still bravely singing, fly Scarce heard amid the guns below.

Take up our quarrel with the foe: To you from failing hands we throw The torch; be yours to hold it high. If ye break faith with us who die We shall not sleep, though poppies grow In Flanders fields.

We are the Dead. Short days ago We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow, Loved and were loved, and now we lie, In Flanders fields.

Lt. Col. John McCrae

BRANCHE

Au dessus l’escalier qui descend vers le jardin, Une branche suspendue. Où se forment les gouttes de pluie qui dans les nuits Sans lune et sans étoiles, Où tout être paraît se perdre sans retour. Où se termine la brume protègent le souvenir, De lumière.

REMEMBER

Above the stairway ascending towards the garden, A hanging branch, where drops of rain take shape, That through the nights without moon and stars Where all being seems to vanish without trace. Where the fog comes to an end, Protect the memory of light. E. A. (Ted) Blodgett

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

TEXT AND TRANSLATIONS

M AG N I F I CAT

He hath put down the mighty from their seat, And hath exalted the humble and meek. He hath filled the hungry with good things And the rich He hath sent empty away. He, remembering His mercy, hath holpen His servant Israel, As He promised to our forefathers, Abraham and his seed forever.

Magnificat anima mea Dominum. Et exsultavit spiritus meus in Deo salutari meo. My soul doth magnify the Lord, And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour. For He hath regarded the lowliness of His handmaiden, For behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed. For He that is mighty hath magnified me, and holy is His name. And His mercy is on them that fear Him throughout all generations. He hath showed strength with His arm, He hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts,

Gloria Patri et Filio, et Spiritui Sancto Sicut erat in principio, et nunc et semper, Et in saeculorum. Amen. Luke 1:46-55

T H E R OA D H O M E

Tell me where is the road I can call my own, That I left, that I lost, so long ago? All these years I have wandered, when will I know There’s a way, there’s a road that will lead me home.

Rise up, follow me, come away is the call With love in your heart as the only song; There is no such beauty as where you belong, Rise up, follow me, I will lead you home.

After wind, after rain, when the dark is done, As I wake from the dream in the gold of day, Through the air there’s a calling from far away, There’s a voice I can hear that will lead me home.

Michael Dennis Browne

N O T H I N G G O L D CA N S TAY

Nature’s first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf’s a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay. Robert Frost

U N C L O U D E D DAY

O they tell me of a home far beyond the skies, They tell me of a home far away, And they tell me of a home Where no storm-clouds rise: O they tell me of an unclouded day

REMEMBER

O they tell me of a home Where my friends have gone, They tell me of a land far away, Where the tree of life in eternal bloom Sheds its fragrance through the unclouded day.

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

TEXT AND TRANSLATIONS

U N C L O U D E D DAY (CO N T)

They tell me of a King in his beauty there, They tell me that mine eyes shall behold Where He sits on a throne That is bright as the sun In the city that is made of gold!

Refrain: O the land of cloudless days, O the land of an unclouded sky, O they tell me of a home Where no storm-clouds rise O they tell me of an unclouded day. J. K. Alwood

I WAS G L A D

I was glad when they said unto me, We will go into the house of the Lord. Our feet shall stand in thy gates, O Jerusalem. Jerusalem is builded as a city that is at unity in itself.

O pray for the peace of Jerusalem, They shall prosper that love thee, Peace be within thy walls, and plenteousness within thy palaces. Psalm 122: 1-3, 6, 7

H OW CA N I K E E P F R O M S I N G I N G?

My life flows on in endless song above earth’s lamentations, I hear the real though faroff tune that hails a new creation. Through all the tumult and the strife, I hear its music ringing, It sounds an echo in my soul, how can I keep from singing?

I lift my eyes, the cloud grows thin; I see the blue above it, And day by day this pathway smooths since first I learned to love it. The peace of love makes fresh my heart, a fountain ever springing, All things are mine in love and joy! How can I keep from singing!

While though the tempest loudly roars, I hear the truth; it liveth And though the darkness ‘round me close, songs in the night it giveth. No storm can shake my inmost calm while to that rock I’m clinging, Since love is Lord of heav’n and earth, how can I keep from singing?

unattributed

REMEMBER

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

RICHARD EATON SINGERS SOPRANO I

A LT O I

TENOR I

BAS S

Anne Brereton Anne Campbell Bev Chappell Barbara Duncan‡ Carolyn Eggert Brenda Enns**‡ Louise Fairley Tammy Farkes Carissa Fedoruk Kimberley Ford Beverlie Gensler Kaitlynd Goertz Cathryn Landreth*‡ Christina Magnusson Donna McGonigle Jodi Penner** Mary Phillips-Rickey Carole Rody-Wu Mary Lynn Schmidt Catherine Taylor

Joan Baker Monica Dear Pam Gowing-Ellenberger Janet Graham Trudy Grienauer Thalia Hartson Kathleen Harvey* Lindsay Johnston Dorothea Korthuis Olga Kostenko‡ Mini Kurian Guylaine Lefebvre-Maunder Carol Marshall Michelle Podmore Heather Starke Mackenzie Steer Maryan Threndyle Colleen Vogel‡

Marlow Christensen Michael Clark Grant Harrison* Manoj Mathew Philip Nabu Naomi Rankin Steven Sayers‡ Bernie Semenjuk Ken Sutley

Stan Backs Reint Boelman Jochen Eggert Nana Owusu Essel Yitian Fan‡ Mark Freeman Brian Haliburton Ian Kellogg Tom Love Arnold Voth*‡ Mike Wayman Jin Yu**‡

SOPRANO II

Marcia Bercov Lesley Dolman**‡ Anita Gainer Elizabeth Green Barbara Halladay* Renee Hardy Josephine Huedepohl Barbara Kallay Ann Lukey Sheila Macdonald Johann Mann Myles McIntosh Izraelle Nabu Sandra Newman Sunita Oommen Kathy Robinson‡ Barbara Sadler Wells Kathryn Steed Mary Stephens

Julia Boberg June Chao Sabina Fassbender Lori Giesbrecht* Kimberly Haag Andrea Hamilton Nancy Kim Patricia Korthuis Manjula Kuruvilla Piper Mutch Kathryn Roberts Lorene Ryhard Rebecca Scholtens Judith Slomp Janet Smith**‡ Margaret Ward-Jack

A LT O I I

REMEMBER

TENOR II Len Gierach* Leroy Hiller Jeremy Keenan Charlie Mballa Jude Nwankwo**‡ Michael Otto John Soong William Strydhorst‡ Sten Thomson Mark Vogel Wayne Wright

* Section Captain ** Section Leader ‡ A Silence Haunts Me Ensemble

BA R I T O N E David Brehmer Paul Cachia Len Christiansen Graham Fast**‡ Dan Hodges Walter Hsu* Troy Janzen John Maxfield Jim McDonald‡ Darryl Rolfson Bernie Schaloske David Sommerfeldt Julian Wigg Markus Wilhelm

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

SUPPORT

Non-Profit Arts Organizations are not possible without support from the community. Please click on the links (digital) or scan the QR code (print) below in appreciation of the many people making this event possible. Richard Eaton Singers Donors, Supporters, Artistic Team and Staff:

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NOVEMBER 10, 2023

23/24 SEASON

HANDEL’S MESSIAH

MOZART | MASS IN C MINOR

Friday & Saturday December 8 & 9 2023 - 7.30pm Winspear Centre, Edmonton

Sunday May 12, 2024 - 2:00pm Winspear Centre, Edmonton

Richard Eaton Singers Edmonton Symphony Orchestra Nicholas McGegan, CONDUCTOR Claire de Sévigné, SOPRANO Georgia Burashko, MEZZO-SOPRANO Isaiah Bell, TENOR Tyler Duncan, BARITONE

Richard Eaton Singers Timothy Shantz, CONDUCTOR RES Orchestra Hannah Pagenkopf, SOPRANO Andrea Hill, SOPRANO John Tessier, TENOR Jin Yu, BARITONE