300 singers to encircle Gardner Hall

The Libby Gardner Concert Hall at the University of Utah seats 680 audience members. And tonight those 680 seats will be surrounded by the voices of roughly 300 singers for a season-opening performance that Utah Choral Artists conductor/director Brady Allred hopes will make quite an impression.

"We want to make a big splash with the opening concert of our season," Allred said. "I thought this would be a great way to do that."

The three choirs that comprise the Utah Choral Artists — Utah Concert Choir, Chamber Choir and Women's Choir — along with the University of Utah Singers and A Capella Choir, and special guest choir Utah Baroque Ensemble, will join forces to provide a "surround-sound" experience. They'll be accompanied by Linda Margetts at the organ, and the instrumental Utah Brass and Chamber Ensemble.

Of course, not all choirs will be singing at the same time. In fact, it will only be the opening number, Vaughan Williams' "Let All the World in Every Corner Sing," and the closing "All Creatures of Our God and King," arranged by Mack Wilberg, that will feature everybody at once.

The rest of the program will feature different combinations of the groups. "We'll have the whole stage area with normal choir risers," said Allred. "We'll be utilizing the choir loft up by the organ, too. The upper balcony, on the sides, will be utilized for some of the pieces, and then we'll even have, in the opening and closing numbers, singers in the aisles down in the first section on the floor."

One of the pieces they'll present, said Allred, is a "Gloria" by William Dufay that dates all the way back to the 1400s. "It's like a canon, with the triple voices and the male voices doing an accompaniment, and it gets progressively closer and closer together. By the end of the Gloria, you're hearing quarter notes being traded back and forth across the hall. So it's a fun little piece." Another fun piece on the program, he said, is a setting of a hymn to the creator from the indigenous people of Nova Scotia. "It's by a Canadian composer named Lydia Adams, and it includes animal sounds. So there will be different people positioned around the hall making various animal sounds that this calls for."

They'll also do some anthems about the virgin Mary, and a piece called "For Amber Waves," based on the text of "Oh Beautiful For Spacious Skies." "(The composer) doesn't use the traditional tune, but it's a very beautiful and effective piece. That one utilizes the most divisi — there are 20 different parts."