Festival Choir Holds Auditions For New Season

Published: September 2, 2004

ATLANTA—The Festival Choir of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, an ensemble made up of 90 singers from over 30 parishes, is holding auditions in September for singers interested in taking part in the 2004-2005 season.

Auditions will be held at the Cathedral of Christ the King on Saturday, Sept. 11, and Saturday, Sept. 18, and all singers in the archdiocese are encouraged to call for an appointment.

The choir, a long-held dream of many local Catholic musicians, was formed in 2003 with the intent of uniting singers from parishes across the archdiocese. Open auditions have been held for the first two seasons and dozens of singers have come forward to lend their voices to the project.

“The whole experience is such a happy one,” said Pam Bousquet, a member of Good Shepherd Church, Cumming. “From the very start of rehearsals it was clear that this process would be fun and exciting.”

Wayne Baughman, director of music at St. Benedict Church, Duluth, said, “Our highest hope was that each singer’s love of music would be enriched and his or her faith deepened by the experience. And, by everyone’s estimation, participants and audience members alike, our performances have done just that.”

In an effort to build upon this promise and success, the choir’s upcoming season will expand to include a liturgical celebration on Sunday, Nov. 7, to celebrate the role of music in the liturgy, in addition to a spring concert.

“For the first two seasons we have concentrated on purely musical and organizational challenges, and have been fairly successful in celebrating great Roman Catholic music. But this year we really wanted to celebrate the musicians that work as ministers in our parishes,” said Kathy Kuczka, director of music at St. Thomas Aquinas Church, Alpharetta. “It is our hope to bring together even more of the diocese’s musicians for a wonderful liturgy of sung prayer.”

The season will also include a concert in April that will feature significant works from two different eras. On April 23 and 24 the choir will present Mozart’s Missa Brevis, a delightful setting of the Mass by the 18th century master, as well as a harmonically rich setting of the Lux Aeterna by California composer Morten Lauridsen.

“These two pieces, though separated by over 200 years reflect the rich diversity and language of music,” said Kevin Culver, a member of the Festival Choir organizational committee. “And it has been, and continues to be one of our most fervent intentions to not only pull together the widely dispersed musicians of the archdiocese, but also to celebrate the wildly diverse history and traditions of Catholic music throughout the ages.”

New singers interested in participating in this year’s projects need to schedule a simple audition. The format will be to sing a verse of “Amazing Grace” and some scales and vocalizations to determine voice part and to sight-read a few measures of music. Contact the music ministry office at the Cathedral of Christ the King at (404) 233-2145, ext. 470, to arrange an audition.