Friends of Music

Choral Concert

Sunday, May 7 at 4:00 PM

Grace Church Friends of Music welcomes New South Festival Singers with Lynn Swanson as Music Director and Organist on Sunday, May 7 at 4:00 PM. Reception will follow in the parish hall.

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Atlanta’s Beloved A Cappella Choir

“…the South’s premier a cappella choir…exceptional tone and ferocious emotion…”

New South Festival Singers concludes their 38th Concert Season with a Bon Voyage Concert as the chorus heads to the invitation only International Piccolo Spoleto Festival in Charleston, South Carolina.

The New South Festival Singers is a professional-level volunteer chorale founded in 1985 by William Baker as Gwinnett Festival Singers, known from 1998-2015 as William Baker Festival Singers, and in recent years as Lynn Swanson Festival Singers and now New South Festival Singers, the ensemble has a rich history of artistic accomplishment. The 32 voice chorale specializes in sacred, short-form a cappella classics and spirituals from across the globe, in addition to annual performances of choral/orchestral masterworks. In addition to numerous appearances on local television programs across the South, and national radio programs such as Performance Today and The Sounds of Majesty, the choir has performed at regional conventions of the American Choral Directors Association, the National Association for Music Education, and the American Guild of Organists. The Festival Singers has been a favorite of Charleston’s Piccolo Spoleto Festival, performing annually to capacity audiences since 1989.

The Atlanta-based New South Festival Singers has performed a large body of choral/orchestral masterworks including the Requiems of Durufle, Faure, Mozart and Brahms, Bach’s St. John Passion, Magnificat, Mass in B minor, and numerous chorale cantatas, Britten’s Rejoice in the Lamb and Festival Te Deum, Kodaly’s Laudes organi, Stravinsky’s Mass and Symphony of Psalms, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, and other masterworks from Tallis to Bernstein.

Piccolo Spoleto Program ~ Mysteries ~ Imagined and Real
Pange Lingua, Gregorian Chant; At the Round Earth’s Imagined Corners, Williametta Spencer; Cool of the Day, J. Ritchie, arr. John Ratledge; In Paradisum from Requiem, Gabriel Faure; Stars, Kyle Pederson; Breathe, Coleman Peterson’ My Song, Ēriks Ešenvalds; Over the Rainbow, Harold Arlen, arr. Sean Sweeden, Composer in Residence The Choral Foundation; Walk Together, Children, arr. Moses Hogan; Let Me Fly, Robert De Cormier; Kyrie and Credo from Gospel Mass, Robert Ray; Amazing Grace, NEW BRITAIN, arr. Janis Lane

Choral Evensong

Sunday June 4 at 4:00 PM

Sung at the close of day in Cathedrals and churches all over the world, Choral Evensong focuses on the ancient practice of singing evening prayers. The congregation listens, joins in the hymns, and adds their own prayers to those of the choir. The Grace Church parish choir will offer several evensongs over the coming liturgical seasons in preparation for their residency at Cathedral Church of St. Peter in Exeter, England from August 5-11, 2024.