Contra Costa Chorale

Dr. Brad Schultz, Director
Martin Morley, Collaborative Keyboard Artist

INTRODUCING OUR SPRING 2025 CONCERT

The Contra Costa Chorale presents their spring program, “Living, Laughing, Loving” on Friday, May 9 at 7:30pm at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, and on Sunday, May 11 at 5:00pm at the Walnut Creek Presbyterian Church.

The program includes a five-century span of compositions by Aaron Copland, Eric Whitacre, Gwyneth Walker, Andrea Ramsey, Joan Szymko, and others. Drawing upon texts by Helen Keller, John Muir, Wendell Berry, and Rabindranath Tagore, the Chorale invites the listener to consider the many ways music can be used as a tool to express the ineffable in today’s world. At the center of the program, a 2023 work by composer Alex Berko titled “Sacred Place” calls us to consider the environment as a living place of safety, comfort, and solace. Laugh along with us as we present the poetry of Ogden Nash set to music, as well as a Renaissance frottola of Rossino Mantovano. Reflect with us on themes of love in sung love-letters to our mother figures on Mother’s day weekend, as well as selections from the Liebeslieder Walzes of Johannes Brahms.

We hope you will join us for a program that speaks to the power of music- both as a language of a wide range of emotions and as a vehicle for expressing big ideas. Make plans now (and invite someone you love) to join us for “Living, Laughing, Loving” in May.

Singing our Hearts Out for Cindy

At our Spring 2024 concerts, the chorale premiered a special piece “Seed” by Joan Szymko which the Chorale had commissioned to honor Cindy Beitmen, our director for over twelve years. Cindy prepared us to perform the piece, but succumbed to cancer before our concerts, and so never heard it performed. In her absence, the Chorale was honored to have the composer conduct both performances of the piece. They were truly memorable experiences.

FALL 2024 CONCERT

The Contra Costa Chorale, led by its new Artistic Director Dr. Brad Schultz, and accompanied by Martin Morley and a small orchestra, returned with a program representing some of the great composers of Vienna, on Friday, December 6, at 7:30PM at Unitarian Universalist Church of Berkeley, 1 Lawson Road, Kensington; and on Sunday, December 8, at 5:00PM at Walnut Creek Presbyterian Church, 1801 Lacassie Avenue, Walnut Creek.

Vienna, Austria has been considered one of the most important centers for music since Mozart’s time. Since then, many of the great European composers have spent time in this city, studying their predecessors and setting the tone for future musicians.

“Viennese Influence(r)s” presented the opportunity to feature a woman whose music was highly respected in the late 1700s., but who has been virtually forgotten until recently. Marianna von Martines, whose “Dixit Dominus” the Chorale performed, studied as a child with Joseph Haydn and grew to heady stature among her musical colleagues, even performing multiple times before Austria’s Empress Maria Theresa. The Chorale also highlighted a performance of “A Silence Haunts Me,” composed by Jake Runestad to a poem by Todd Boss, which represents the dark thoughts of Beethoven as he faced his growing deafness and questioned his strength to continue living.

“Classical music lovers often feel a strong connection to the music centers of Europe–especially Vienna,” says Artistic Director Brad Schultz. “This was certainly the case for my predecessor, Cindy Beitmen, who spent many formative years there. Many composers in this concert are likely quite familiar, but even in a city so rooted in the Classical canon as Vienna, there are still some surprises to be found. In this, the Contra Costa Chorale’s next chapter, I explored that blend of the familiar and surprising, with singers and audience alike.”

“Viennese Influence(r)s” looked at some of the greatest of these composers, examining the connections that stretch both backward and into the future. Today, Vienna and music are inseparable, thanks to the heritage established in the 1700s and new music that thrives today. From Mozart to Martines, Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner, the Contra Costa Chorale has celebrated a city that has inspired musicians all over the world.

For further information, please contact cocochorale@gmail.com, or call at 510-730-0202.

Fall 2024 Concert Program

Would you like to hear us right now? Click on the audio files below to experience works from our past concerts:

Ain’ a that good news – arr. William Dawson