𝗡𝗔𝗧𝗜𝗢𝗡𝗔𝗟 𝗖𝗛𝗢𝗜𝗥 𝗧𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗧𝗢 𝗣𝗘𝗥𝗙𝗢𝗥𝗠 𝗜𝗡 𝗠𝗧. 𝗦𝗧𝗘𝗥𝗟𝗜𝗡𝗚

MT. STERLING, KY: As a part of the newly announced Cay R. Lane Event Series, the Kenyon College Chamber Singers, conducted by Dr. Benjamin Locke, will be performing on Friday, March 10, 2023, at the Lewis Apperson White Performance Hall, Gateway Regional Arts Center, 101 East Main Street, Mt. Sterling, Kentucky, at 7:30 p.m. General admission is $5.00.

“We are honored to have this esteemed national tour performing in our community,” said GRAC Executive Director Jordan Campbell. “As a choir student growing up, I know how much this community values choral music, and music education. I know our community will give these fabulous Kenyon Chamber Singers a warm welcome.”

The Chamber Singers, consisting of forty-eight undergraduates chosen by competitive audition, is Kenyon's premier touring ensemble. The group is noted for its versatility of vocal style and broad repertoire. The New York Concert Review applauded the artistry of the ensemble, stating “the young members of the Chamber Singers...retain the proper lightness to navigate the translucent textures of Sweelinck’s Cantate Domino and Palestrina’s Sicut Cervus...focused intently on the conductor, the singers kept their audience hanging on every word.”

The Chamber Singers will again present an eclectic mix of a cappella choral repertoire on their 2023 Spring Tour. A centerpiece to the program will be Johannes Brahms’s motet Warum ist das Licht gegeben dem Mühseligen (Why is light given to those in misery), with numerous other compositions by composers Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina, Joan Szymko, Moses Hogan, Frank Ticheli, Alice Parker, and Juhani Komulainen. The ensemble is noted for its regular inclusion of music from South Africa, which this year includes Shilohini, a Tsonga folksong about the awaited return of loved ones lost at sea.

The members of Chamber Singers come from sixteen states as well as the countries of Egypt and the United Kingdom. A minority of the singers have declared music as their academic major, with the rest having chosen fields such as neuroscience, history, biology, physics, psychology, political science, and English, to name but a few.

All the singers value music as an integral part of a liberal-arts education and take great

pride in reaching for the highest musical standards in performance. Benjamin Locke is in his thirty-ninth year at Kenyon. He directs the Kenyon Community Choir, teaches music theory, conducting and voice, and is also the musical director of the Knox County Symphony (based in Mount Vernon, Ohio). He has written several research articles on the choral music of Johannes Brahms and has also published many transcriptions and arrangements of South African folksongs. Dr. Locke earned his Doctor of Musical Arts degree from the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he studied extensively with Robert Fountain.

The Music Department consists of six distinguished faculty in the areas of

musicology, music theory and performance, and ethnomusicology. The Department

resides in the Storer Music Building with state-of-the-art classrooms and performance

spaces. Applied study is offered in piano, woodwinds, brass, strings, and voice as well as organ, harp, harpsichord and percussion by our talented adjunct faculty. Both music majors and non-majors participate in the numerous instrumental and vocal ensembles on campus.

Kenyon College is Ohio's oldest private college and has been building a reputation for excellence for more than one hundred ninety-nine years. It boasts a remarkably dedicated faculty, a carefully planned liberal arts curriculum, a highly capable student body, and alumni who have contributed significantly in all walks of life.