Liner Notes: Melodious Accord

I. Welcome    1. House of our God (Zion) [2:15]    2. Lord, I approach thy mercy seat (Burford) [2:18]    3. Come, ye disconsolate [3:35] II. Old Testament    4. Be Joyful in God [1:33]    5. The voice of my beloved sounds (Spring) [2:27]    6. Guide me, O thou great Jehovah (Tamworth) [2:50] III. New Testament    7. When I survey the wondrous Cross (Retirement) [2:10]    8. Come, O thou traveler unknown (Vernon) [2:32]    9. O how happy are they (New Concord) [2:01] IV. Farewells    10. That glorious day is drawing nigh (Zion’s Light) [2:16]    11. How sweet to reflect (Eden of Love) [3:48]    12. How pleasant thus to dwell below (The Parting Hymn) [2:44]    13. God moves in a mysterious way (Union) [5:42] Alice Parker, Conductor    14. Wesley [1:58]    15. Idumea [2:10]    16. Sweet Prospect [2:16]    17. Wondrous Love [4:23]    18. Hiding Place [1:36]    19. His Voice as the Sound of the Dulcimer [2:18]    20. Saints Bound for Heaven [2:33] Total Playing Time [54:41]

Master Chorale of Washington Donald McCullough, Music Director Alice Parker, Special Guest Conductor MELODIOUS ACCORD Harmonia Sacra tunes and texts from Genuine Church Music Edited by Joseph Funk and published in 1832. Arranged by Alice Parker. Published by E. C. Schirmer Music Co., Inc. Conducted by Donald McCullough

A Tribute to Paul Hill

The concert recorded on this compact disc, which took place on November 14, 1999 at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, D.C., was not originally envisioned as a tribute to Paul Hill. Indeed, there was every reason to believe that the founder and conductor emeritus would attend and listen from his usual vantage point in the first tier balcony to the exquisite sound of more than 130 singers lifting their voices to make glorious music as he had on so many previous occasions. But it was not to be. Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, the same crippling disease that had forced Paul to relinquish his baton three years earlier, had finally laid its inevitable claim on his life.

This performance became a memorial concert dedicated to Paul -- a loving gift offered by the choral group he had created and forged into one of the finest in the nation’s capital. Despite these unfortunate circumstances, however, it would be hard to imagine a more fitting tribute. Paul had devoted his life to choral music, gathering people with differing backgrounds and diverse musical skills, and convincing them that they could make beautiful music together. In this concert, Paul’s successor, Donald McCullough, invited choir members from area churches to sing part of the concert with the Master Chorale of Washington and experience the joy of shape-note music conducted by Paul’s friend, Alice Parker. This tradition of communal singing dates back to the earliest days of the American republic. Maestro McCullough conducted the Master Chorale of Washington in its performance of Ms. Parker’s Melodious Accord.

The Shape-Note Tradition

For inhabitants of one of the villages or hamlets dotting the American landscape in the 18th and early 19th century, music meant something far different than it does today. In those times, concert opportunities were mostly limited to the coastal cities. Only a cultivated few would even have heard the names of such composers as Bach, Mozart, Haydn, or Beethoven, and likely only city-dwellers or those who had traveled to Europe might have actually heard their music, so familiar to our modern ears. Yet music of a different kind played a central role in the spiritual and social lives of these early rural Americans.

Each Sabbath day villagers gathered to sing the simple, two-part hymns passed down to each new generation by the one before. Many of these church hymns had Old World roots, traveling to America on the lips of immigrants. Lifting voices together in song--even the few rudimentary songs in widespread use at the time—helped cement communal bonds among people from disparate origins struggling to create a shared identity in a new land. But the people clearly thirsted for something more from their music.

Beginning in the 1720s, the first published song collections started appearing in the colonies. One of the earliest, An Introduction to the Singing of Psalm Tunes, published in 1721, contained only 25 sacred songs, but it quickly became popular among the New England church congregations. The book--and others like it that appeared in succeeding years--used “shape-note” symbols instead of actual musical notes. Each shape corresponded to a different note on the scale, and singers learned to associate each symbol with a sung syllable--fa sol la mi. (This also explains why this “help to read” system became known as “fasola” singing.) In the most commonly used shape-note system, the singers’ scale--corresponding to the “do re mi” scale more familiar to us--repeated fa-so-la twice on an ascending pattern, with mi as the seventh pitch.

But how were colonists to learn the system? By the 1770s, singing schools, in which teaching masters would lead their students through month-long classes using one of the “fasola” songbooks, began appearing on the New England scene. Though the schools were sometimes subsidized by wealthy landowners, it was more common for the hard-working farmers to pay for lessons themselves. These classes required an amazing time commitment for people struggling to eke out a living from the land. Typical singing schools lasted for 28 days, with daily practices lasting three hours. Once the students had completed the lessons, they shared what they had learned with their fellow settlers, and those who came merely to listen could feel the infectious joy of their music-making. Often, after the teaching masters moved on to a different town, the students swelled the ranks of the local choirs, now singing a repertoire expanded by their newly purchased singing books.
But from their earliest beginnings--according to George Pullen Jackson, author of the comprehensive 1933 study White Spirituals in the Southern Uplands--the singing schools faced scorn and disdain from city-dwellers, both in the major cities of the East and, as settlement moved slowly westward, in such cities as Cincinnati and St. Louis. As areas became settled and populations swelled, there was pressure to adopt European musical styles and tastes. In most large cities musical academies sponsored concerts and visiting performers. Many churches--starting in New England but spreading westward with settlement--also began installing organs that tended to drown out the spare harmonic sounds of the singing-school graduates. Faced with such obstacles among city-dwellers, teaching masters had no choice but to strike out in search of rural populations, where they were welcomed enthusiastically. Some headed West, but more followed the ridge of the Appalachians into Virginia and the Deep South.

As time went on, local Southern teaching masters began adopting the “Yankee” methods to start their own migratory singing schools. One of these was Joseph Funk, a Mennonite farmer whose family had migrated from eastern Pennsylvania to settle in Harrisonburg, Virginia, near the Shenandoah Valley. Though little is known about Funk’s early musical education, we do know that in 1816, at the age of 38, he published a modest 88-page book called Choral-Music, a compilation of German church hymns, mostly written in two-part (male) harmony. Just nine years later he produced a second, much more significant book called Genuine Church Music (in later editions called Harmonia Sacra). From this book and other similar collections that began appearing in other regions of the country, it becomes clear that--despite the condescension of the urban musical naysayers--there existed a significant body of quality music among the rural hills and vales of America. This is not to suggest that all of the music was worth preserving. Some of the compilations, particularly later editions, were obviously put together by amateur musicologists whose Christian inspiration sometimes outstripped their musical ability. But many of the tunes in Funk's 180-page book contain sophisticated harmonies and lovely tunes. They suggest many influences, mirroring the varied origins of the people who gathered to sing them--Germanic hymns, Celtic lays, English ballads--all inflected with something fresh and unique that one can only call American.

Partly this impression comes from the open scale used in many of the arrangements. Unlike the closed tones more familiar to our modern ears, these open harmonics lend a kind of mountain wildness to the melodies (given to the tenors) that suggests timelessness, as though they are as old as the hills. And perhaps they are. “Fasola” singing, or at least some variant of the method used in early America, had origins at least as early as Elizabethan times. Many of the tunes gathered by Funk and others existed long before he published them in his collection.

Genuine Church Music was hugely popular in the Shenandoah region, with the first four editions selling 28,000 copies. Though copies were sold as far north as Canada and as far south as Alabama and Mississippi, its influence was mostly restricted to the area where Funk taught. This became the pattern, as other compilers spawned their own regional collections in Alabama, Georgia, and points west, and each collection generated its own regional style. Even the shape-note system had regional variations, though most compilers continued to use some version of it, recognizing the need to render their music in an accessible format. Some of the songbooks enjoyed long use among local singers and many went through multiple editions. The passage of time, however, tended to smooth out idiosyncrasies that gave the original shape-note books their distinctive character. Many attempts to “improve” the arrangements--adding an alto line to the harmony or tinkering with the tunes and poetry--often yielded inferior results. In most cases, the older books--such as the original editions of Genuine Church Music--remain the best.

The concert on this recording captures in many ways the spirit of shape note conventions, which are still held today in many parts of the country. The invited singers from the community joined the Master Chorale of Washington, Alice Parker conducting, to perform Wesley--Come Children of Zion (Track 14), Idumea--Is This the Kind Return? (Track 15), and Sweet Prospect--On Jordan’s Stormy Banks I Stand (Track 16). These singers surrounded the audience in the traditional hollow square formation. This formation allowed the singers to face and sing to each other (hence the name hollow square), but for this event the Kennedy Center audience sat within the embrace of the swirling harmonies. These hymns are derived from melodies that adhere as closely as possible to ones found in the original shape-note songbooks.

Some of these melodies will be familiar, having made their way gradually into mainstream religious hymn books; others will seem familiar, because they have issued forth from musical strains we may all call our own. It is perhaps fitting that these selections are conducted by Alice Parker, who has devoted her life to ensuring that these folk hymns are preserved and passed on to new generations of music lovers. Along with the late Robert Shaw, Ms. Parker has achieved deserved acclaim for her own folk-hymn arrangements; and Wondrous Love, Hiding Place--Hail, Sov’reign Love, His Voice as the Sound, and Saints Bound for Heaven (tracks 17-20) feature the Master Chorale of Washington performing under Ms. Parker’s baton. Characteristically, these folk-hymns possess captivating harmonic motions that Parker and Shaw often underscore by dividing the melodic line among several vocal parts, almost like a round. Added to their open tonality, the treatment lends the pieces an eternal quality quite in keeping with their accompanying sacred texts.

The featured selection on this recording is Alice Parker’s Melodious Accord, performed by the Master Chorale of Washington and conducted by Music Director Donald McCullough—a former student of Ms. Parker. Based on hymns drawn from early editions of Genuine Church Music by Joseph Funk, Melodious Accord might be considered a modern extension of his mission. Indeed, Ms. Parker has performed the same process of preservation and transmission, working with the poetry and music of the original but arranging and molding the pieces into a statement all her own. “I make no distinction between composer and arranger,” she has said, and throughout her distinguished career she has forged an original style that is instantly recognizable to her legion of choral admirers.

Subtitled a “Concert of Praise,” Melodious Accord is organized in the form of a liturgical service and is divided into four sections, “Welcome,” “Old Testament,” “New Testament,” and “Farewells.” The internal designations carry several connotations: hymns gathered under each section relate to texts from the Bible, but also carry significant messages of their own. The hymns included in the “Welcome” section, for instance, welcome congregants into the larger company of God’s people, just as those in the “Farewells” section offer solace to people whose loved ones have departed, a fitting remembrance to the passing of Maestro Paul Hill. His loss will be mourned, but his legacy will long live on in the lives of the singers and fellow musicians whom he inspired and touched with his music.

-- James Carman

MELODIOUS ACCORD -- Harmonia Sacra tunes and texts from Genuine Church Music,
Edited by Joseph Funk and published in 1832. Arranged by Alice Parker
Published by E. C. Schirmer Music Co., Inc.
Conducted by Donald McCullough

I. Welcome
1. House of our God (Zion)
Angela Powell, soprano
Grace Gori, mezzo-soprano
Charles Reid, tenor
Steven Combs, baritone

House of our God, with cheerful anthems ring.
While all our lips and hearts his goodness sing;
With sacred joy his wondrous deeds proclaim,
Let every tongue be vocal with (pronounce) his name;
The Lord is good his mercy never ending,
His goodness in perpetual show’rs descending.

Thou, earth, enlighten’d by his rays divine,
Pregnant with grass and corn and oil and wine.
Crown’d with his goodness, let thy nations meet,
And lay themselves at his paternal feet;
With grateful love that lib’ral hand confessing,
Which thro’ each heart diffuseth every blessing.

Zion, enriched with his distinguished grace,
Bless’d with the rays of thine Immanuel’s face;
Zion, Jehovah’s portion and delight.
Grav’n on his hand and hourly in his sight,
In sacred strains exalt that grace excelling,
Which makes thine humble hill his chosen dwelling. Amen.

2. Lord, I approach thy mercy-seat (Burford)
Lord, I approach Thy mercy-seat,
Where Thou dost answer prayer;
There humbly fall beneath thy feet
For none doth perish there.

Thy promise is my only plea;
With this I venture nigh;
Thou callest burden’d souls to thee,
And such, O Lord, am I.

Bowed down beneath a load of sin,
By Satan sorely press’d,
By war without and fear within,
I come to thee for rest.

Be thou my Shield, my hiding place;
That shelter’d near thy side,
I may my fierce accuser face,
And tell him, thou hast died.

3. Come, ye disconsolate
Steven Combs, baritone

Come, ye disconsolate, where e’er you languish.
Come, at the mercy seat—fervently kneel;
Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your anguish,
Earth hath no sorrow that heav’n cannot heal.

Joy to the desolate, light of the straying,
Hope when all others die, fadeless and pure.
Here speaks the Comforter, in mercy saying:
“ Earth hath no sorrow that heav’n cannot cure.”

Here see the bread of life, see waters flowing
Forth from the throne of God pure from above;
Come to the feast prepared, Come, ever knowing;
Earth hath no sorrow but heav’n can remove.

II. Old Testament
4. Be joyful in God
Be joyful in God, all ye lands of the earth,
Oh serve him with gladness and fear;
Exult in his presence with music and mirth,
With love and devotion draw near.
Jehovah is God, and Jehovah alone
Who reigns with his Son above all,
And we are his people, his sceptre we own,
His sheep, and we follow his call.

O enter his gates with thanksgiving and song,
Your vow in his temple proclaim.
His praise with melodious accordance prolong,
And bless his adorable Name;
For good is the Lord, inexpressibly good,
And we are the works of hs hand,
His mercy and truth from eternity stood,
And shall to eternity stand!

5. The voice of my beloved sounds (Spring)
Angela Powell, soprano
Grace Gori, mezzo-soprano

The voice of my beloved sounds,
While o’er the mountain top he bounds.
He flies exulting o’er the hills,
And all my soul with transport fills.
Gently doth he chide my stay,
“ Rise, my love, and come away.”

The scatter’d clouds are fled at last,
The rain is gone, the winter’s past.
The lovely vernal flow’rs appear,
The warbling choir enchants our ear.
Now with sweetly pensive moan,
Coos the turtle dove alone.

6. Guide me, O thou great Jehovah (Tamworth)
Guide me, O thou great Jehovah,
Pilgrim through this barren land;
I am weak, but thou art mighty,
Hold me with thy pow’rful hand;
Bread of heaven,
Feed me till I want no more.

Open now the crystal fountain
Whence the healing streams do flow;
Let the fiery, cloudy pillar
Lead me all my journey through;
Strong Deliv’rer, Be thou still my Strength and Shield.

Feed me with the heav’nly manna
In the barren wilderness;
Be my sword and shield and banner,
Be my robe of righteousness;
Fight and conquer All my foes by sov’reign grace.

When I tread the verge of Jordan
Let my anxious fears subside;
Foe to death and hell’s destruction,
Land me safe on Canaan’s side;
Songs of praises I will ever sing to thee.

III. New Testament
7. When I survey the wondrous Cross (Retirement)
Grace Gori, mezzo-soprano

When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of Glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast
Save in the death of Christ my God;
All the vain things that charm me most.
I sacrifice them to his blood.

Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small,
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.

8. Come,O thou traveler unknown (Vernon)
Charles Reid, tenor

Come, O thou traveler unknown,
Whom still I hold but cannot see;
My company before is gone,
And I am left alone with thee;
With thee all night I mean to stay,
And wrestle till the break of day.

In vain thou strugglest to get free,
I never will unloose my hold;
Art thou the man that died for me?
The secret of thy love unfold;
Wrestling, I will not let thee go,
Till I thy Name, thy nature know.

‘Tis love! ‘Tis love! Thou diedst for me,
I hear thy whisper in my heart.
The morning breaks, the shadows flee;
Pure universal love thou art,
To me, to all, thy mercies move,
Thy nature, and thy Name is Love.

9. O how happy are they (New Concord)
O how happy are they, who their Savior obey,
And have laid up their treasure above,
Oh! What tongue can express the sweet comfort and peace
Of a soul in its earliest love.

‘Twas a heaven below My Redeemer to know;
And the angels could do nothing more
Than to fall at his feet and the story repeat,
And the Savior of sinners adore.

Jesus all the day long was my joy and my song;
Oh! That more his salvation might see;
He hath loved me, I cried, He hath suffer’d and died
To redeem such a rebel as me.

Now my remnant of days would I spend in his praise,
Who hath died, me from death to redeem;
Whether many or few, all my days are his due;
May they all be devoted to him.

IV. Farewells
10. That glorious day is drawing nigh (Zion’s Light)
That glorious day is drawing nigh,
When Zion’s light shall come;
She shall arise and shine on high,
Bright as the rising sun.

The north and south their sons resign,
And earth’s foundations bend;
Cloth’d as a bride, Jerusalem
All glorious shall descend.

The King who wears the splendid crown,
The azure’s flaming bow;
The holy city shall bring down,
To bless his Church below.
When Zion’s bleeding, conqu’ring King
Shall sin and death destroy,
The morning stars shall join to sing,
And Zion’s shout for joy.

11. How sweet to reflect (Eden of Love)
Charles Reid, tenor
How sweet to reflect on the joys that await me
In yon blissful region the haven of rest,
Where glorified spirits with welcome shall greet me,
And lead me to mansions prepared for the blest,
Encircled in light, and with glory unshrouded,
My happiness perfect, my mind’s sky unclouded,
I’ll bathe in the ocean of pleasure unbounded,
And range with delight through the Eden of love.

When angelic legions with harps tuned celestial,
Harmoniously join in the concert of praise,
The saints, as they flock from the regions terrestrial,
In loud hallelujahs their voices will raise.
Then songs of the Lamb shall re-echo through heaven,
My soul will respond, To Immanuel be given,
All glory, all honor, all might and dominion,
Who brought us through grace to the Eden of love.
All glory, all honor, all might and dominion, Hallelujah.

12. How pleasant thus to dwell below (The Parting Hymn)
Angela Powell, soprano
Grace Gori, mezzo-soprano
Charles Reid, tenor
Steven Combs, baritone
How pleasant thus to dwell below in fellowship of love;
And though we part, ‘tis bliss to know
The good shall meet above.

Refrain
Oh! That will be joyful, joyful, joyful,
To meet to part no more,
On Canaan’s happy shore,
And sing the everlasting song
With those who’ve gone before.

The children who have loved the Lord
Will hail their teachers there,
And teachers gain the rich reward
Of all their toil and care;
Refrain

Yes, happy thought, when we are free
From earthly grief and pain;
In heav’n we shall each other see,
And never part again.
Refrain

13. God moves in a mysterious way (Union)
God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.

Deep in unfathomable mines
Of never failing skill,
He treasures up his vast designs,
And works his sov’reign will.

Ye fearful saints, fresh courage take;
The clouds ye so much dread
Are big with mercy, and shall break
In blessings on your head.

Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust his grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.

His purposes will ripen fast,
Unfolding every hour;
The bud may leave a bitter taste,
But sweet will be the flower.

Blind unbelief is sure to err,
And scan his work in vain;
God is his own interpreter,
And he will make it plain.
Amen.

Wesley -- Arranged by Alice Parker in Singers Glen
Published by Hinshaw Music, Inc.
Conducted by Alice Parker
With Hollow Square Singers

Come, children of Zion, and help us to sing
Loud anthems of praise to our Savior and King,
Whose life once was given our souls to redeem,
And bring us to heaven to reign there with Him.

O come to the Savior, and take up the cross;
Seek treasure in heaven, count all else but loss;
His mercy invites us, then let us comply;
O why should we linger when He is so nigh.

We’ll fear not the dangers that lie in our way.
His arm will protect us by night and by day:
All this we must suffer, and patiently bear
Till Jesus shall take us where suff’rings are o’er.

Idumea -- Isaac Watts (Traditional)
Conducted by Alice Parker
With Hollow Square Singers

Is this the kind return,
And these the thanks we owe,
Thus to abuse eternal love,
Whence all our blessings flow?

To what a stubborn frame
Hath sin reduced our mind!
What strange rebellious wretches we,
And God as strangely kind.

Turn, turn us, mighty God!
And mould our souls afresh!
Break, sovereign grace, these hearts of stone,
And give us hearts of flesh!

Sweet Prospect -- William Walker (Traditional)
Conducted by Alice Parker
With Hollow Square Singers

On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand,
And cast a wishful eye,
To Canaan’s fair and happy land,
Where my possessions lie.

Refrain
Oh, the transporting, rapt’rous scene,
That rises to my sight,
Sweet fields arrayed in living green,
And rivers of delight.

O’er all those wide extended plains,
Shines one eternal day;
There God the Son forever reigns,
And scatters night away.
Refrain

No chilling winds, or poisonous breath,
Can reach that healthful shore;
Sickness and sorrow, pain and death,
Are felt and feared no more.
Refrain

Wondrous Love -- Traditional, Arranged by Alice Parker and Robert Shaw
Published by Lawson-Gould Music Publishers, Inc.
Conducted by Alice Parker

What wondrous love is this,
O my soul, O my soul.
What wondrous love is this,
That caused the Lord of bliss
To bear the dreadful curse for my soul.

When I was sinking down, O my soul,
When I was sinking down
Beneath God’s righteous frown,
Christ laid aside His crown
For my soul, for my soul.

To God and to the Lamb I will sing,
To God and to the Lamb,
Who is the great I am
While millions join the theme,
I will sing, I will sing.

And when from death I’m free
I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on.
And when from death I’m free,
I’ll sing and joyful be,
And thro’ eternity I’ll sing on, I’ll sing on.

Hiding Place -- Traditional, Arranged by Alice Parker in Singers Glen
Published by Hinshaw Music, Inc.
Conducted by Alice Parker

Hail sov’reign love, that first began
The scheme to rescue fallen man;
Hail, matchless, free eternal grace
That gave my soul a hiding place.

Against the God that built the sky,
I fought with hands uplifted high;
Despised the mansions of His grace,
Too proud to seek a hiding place.

But lo! Th’eternal counsel rang,
“ Almighy love, arrest the man;”
I felt the arrows of distress,
And found I had no hiding place.

But lo! A heav’nly voice I heard,
And mercy’s angel soon appear’d,
Who led me on a pleasing pace
To Jesus Christ, my hiding place.

His Voice as the Sound -- Traditional, Arranged by Alice Parker and Robert Shaw
Published by Lawson-Gould Music Publishers, Inc.
Conducted by Alice Parker

His voice as the sound of the dulcimer sweet,
Is heard thro’ the shadows of death;
The cedars of Lebanon bow at his feet,
The air is perfum’d with his breath.

His lips as a fountain of righteousness flow
That waters the garden of grace,
From which their salvation the Gentiles shall know,
And bask in the smile of his face.

Love sits in his eyelids and scatters delight
Thro’ all the bright regions on high.
Their faces the Cherubim veil in his sight,
And tremble with fullness of joy.

He looks, and ten thousands of angels rejoice,
And myriads wait for his word,
He speaks, and eternity filled with his voice,
Re-echoes the praise of her Lord.

Saints Bound for Heaven -- Traditional, Arranged by Alice Parker and Robert Shaw
Published by Lawson-Gould Music Publishers, Inc.
Conducted by Alice Parker

Our bondage it shall end by and by.
From Egypt’s yoke set free,
Hail the glorious jubilee,
And to Canaan we’ll return by and by.

Our Deliverer He shall come by and by.
And our sorrows have an end
With our three score years and ten,
And vast glory crown the day by and by.

And when to Jordan’s floods we are come,
Jehovah rules the tide
And the waters He’ll divide,
And the ransom’d host shall shout we are come.

Then with all the happy throng we’ll rejoice.
Shouting Glory to our King,
Till the vaults of heaven ring,
And thro’ all eternity we’ll rejoice.

Shouting glory, glory, hallelujah!

Meet the Artists

Donald McCullough has been music director of the Master Chorale of Washington and Master Chorale Chamber Singers since 1996. Prior to coming to Washington, DC, he founded and conducted the highly acclaimed McCullough Chorale, Virginia’s only fully professional choral ensemble, and the Virginia Symphony Chorus in Norfolk, Virginia. Under his leadership the Master Chorale of Washington has released two compact discs and was featured prominently in the July 2000 Dvorák Festival in Prague and at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest, where Mr. McCullough conducted concerts accompanied by the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra. Mr. McCullough is strongly committed to developing the vocal talent of young singers and has been guest conductor of numerous state and regional youth choral festivals. He initiated the District of Columbia Public Schools All-City Middle/Junior High Honors Chorus in partnership with the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the Master Chorale. Mr. McCullough is an active arranger and composer with many published titles to his credit. His Holocaust Cantata had its world premiere by the Chamber Singers at the Kennedy Center in 1998, was released on CD in 1999, and was featured in the New York Times and Washington Times and on CNN. Mr. McCullough is a member of the Chorus America board of directors and has served on an international consortium of conductors for the Barlow Endowment for Composition. He holds bachelor’s degrees in organ and vocal performance from Stetson University and master’s degrees in sacred music and vocal performance from Southern Methodist University, and studied conducting with Robert Page and music composition with Adolphus Hailstork and Alice Parker.

Composer, conductor and teacher Alice Parker, who has said she sang before she spoke, has had a career spanning almost six decades devoted to the creation of works for the human voice. She began composing at age five and wrote her first orchestral score while still in high school. At Smith College and the Juilliard School she studied composition and conducting, and also began her long association with Robert Shaw. Their many settings of American folksongs, hymns and spirituals form an enduring repertoire for choruses around the world. Through the years Ms. Parker has continued composing in all the choral forms, from opera to cantata, from sacred anthems to songs with texts by distinguished poets. In 1985 she started her own professional choral ensemble, Melodious Accord, which focuses on what is for her the heart of vocal music: the melody. Mr. Shaw said, “She possesses a rare and creative musical intelligence.” Ms. Parker has published books on melodic styles, choral improvisation, and “Good Singing in Church.” She is the recipient of four honorary doctorates and the Smith College Medal and has been awarded grants from the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, National Endowment for the Arts, and American Music Center. She is a member of the Chorus America board of directors.

Angela Powell (soprano) has toured extensively throughout the United States and Europe, including performances of the Fauré Requiem with the Master Chorale of Washington and the Prague Symphony Orchestra. She has appeared as Le Contessa in Le Nozze di Figaro, Rosalinda in Die Fledermaus, Micaela in Carmen, Donna Elvira in Don Giovanni and the title role in Carlisle Floyd’s Susanna. Her varied repertoire includes such unusual opera roles as Mother Earth in Hailstorks’s Paul Lawrence Dunbar:Common Ground, Madame Euterpova in Menotti’s Help, Help the Globolinks, and Marfa in Rimsky-Korsakov’s Tzars Bride. Ms. Powell is a featured soloist at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, the Smithsonian Institution Gershwin Centennial Concert, and throughout the Metropolitan Washington DC area. She received a bachelor’s degree in music from Oberlin Conservatory and a master’s degree in voice from the University of Maryland. Ms. Powell has received performance awards from the Metropolitan National Council Auditions, Houston Grand Opera Competition, National Symphony Orchestra Young Artist Competition, National Association of Arts and Letters Vocal Competition and the Maryland State Arts Council’s highest grant awarded to an individual artist. Recordings include Christmas with the Master Chorale of Washington and Holocaust Cantata with the Master Chorale Chamber Singers.

Grace Gori (mezzo-soprano) has performed throughout the United States, Canada, Austria and Germany. She has been acclaimed for her portrayals of Cherubino in Annapolis Opera’s The Marriage of Figaro and Tessa in the Washington Savoyard’s production of Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Gondoliers. A 1994 graduate of the University of Maryland’s Maryland Opera Studio, Ms. Gori earned her bachelor’s degree at the Indiana University School of Music in Bloomington, Indiana, and was a student in the Munich Hochschule für Musik in 1990 and 1991. In the Washington DC area, Ms. Gori has been a featured soloist with the Cathedral Choral Society, New Dominion Chorale, Washington Bach Consort Noon Cantata Series, and McLean Choral Society. She has been seen as Annia in Mozart’s Titus (La clemenza di Tito) with the “In” Series at Mount Vernon College and in the title role of Bizet’s Carmen. Ms. Gori was a semi-finalist in both the 1998 Center for Contemporary Opera Vocal Competition and the 1999 Oratorio Society of New York Vocal Competition, and made her debut with the Washington Chamber Symphony at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.

Charles Reid (tenor) made his Metropolitan Opera debut in Richard Strauss’ Capriccio in 1997 and performed the role of Lennie in the Glimmerglass Opera touring production of Carlisle Floyd’s Of Mice and Men. He has appeared in the Maryland Handel Festival’s performances of Joshua and Alexander Balus in which he sang Joshua and Jonathan, Lincoln Center’s Mostly Mozart Festival performance of Richard Strauss’ arrangement of Mozart’s Idomeneo, and was heard as the Evangelist in Fuma Sacra’s performance of J.S. Bach’s St. John’s Passion. He has performed with the Sarasota Opera, Baltimore Choral Arts Society, St. Ignatius Loyola (NYC), Columbia Pro Cantare, and Princeton Pro Musica. Mr. Reid has won numerous prestigious awards including the 1997 Richard Tucker Music Foundation Jacobson Study Grant, was grand prize winner of both the Florida Grand Opera YPO Competition and the Annapolis Opera Vocal Competition. He was an award winning finalist in the Loren L. Zachary National Vocal Competition and the New Jersey State Opera International Vocal Competition.

Steven Combs (baritone) made his Metropolitan Opera debut under the baton of James Levine in the world premiere of John Corigliano’s The Ghosts of Versailles, which was televised on PBS. He appeared with the Opera Theatre of St. Louis in the title role of Colin Graham’s first staging of Britten’s Billy Budd and as Demetrius in Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. He was soloist in Saint-Saëns Oratorio de Noël and Mendelssohn’s Von Himmel Hoch with Cathedral Choral Society, and featured in the world premiere of Donald McCullough’s highly acclaimed Holocaust Cantata and subsequent recording. A graduate of the University of Delaware with a Bachelor of Music degree and a Master of Music degree from the University of Minnesota, Mr. Combs has won the National Association of Teachers of Singing Competition, a Licia Albanese-Puccini Foundation study grant, a Sullivan Award, and is a Metropolitan Opera National Council Audition winner. He has made solo appearances in Vaughan Williams’ Mystical Songs with the Master Chorale Chamber Singers, in Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 at the Basilica of the Assumption in Baltimore, and with Washington Bach Consort.

The Master Chorale of Washington has attracted praise from critics worldwide for over 200 performances at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington DC, American and European tours, and national radio and television broadcasts. Founded by the late Paul Hill in 1967, the Chorale was featured in the inaugural concert of the Kennedy Center Concert Hall and performs eight to ten times there annually on its own subscription series and as guest chorus for other arts organizations. The Chorale often performs with the National Symphony Orchestra, including Rob Kapilow’s Citypiece: DC Monuments in June 2000, A Summer Night in Vienna at Wolf Trap, and Ravel’s Daphnis and Chloe. It has appeared with the Joffrey Ballet, Virginia Symphony, Washington Chamber Symphony, Richmond Symphony, and Northwest Pacific Ballet. The Master Chorale made its Carnegie Hall debut in 1990 and has appeared three times on Garrison Keillor’s American Radio Company. The ensemble toured Central Europe in the summer of 2000, performing with the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra at the Rudolfinum Concert Hall in Prague, the Dvorák Festival in Zlonice, and the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest. In 1998, Chorale members performed in the Pageant of Peace as part of the Lighting of the National Christmas Tree ceremony. Well-known for innovative programming, the Chorale has commissioned and premiered numerous new works by such noted American composers as Ned Rorem, Samuel Adler, Gregg Smith, Daniel Gawthrop, Mark Adamo, and many from the Washington, DC area. The Master Chorale is the only symphonic chorus in Washington with a core of professional singers. It was selected from all choruses with professional cores in the U.S. and Canada to receive the prestigious Margaret Hillis Award in 1999 from Chorus America, the national organization of choral ensembles.

Master Chorale of Washington

* Member of the professional core.

Master Choraleof Washington Ensemble

Melodious Accord
Master Chorale of Washington
Donald McCullough, Music Director
Alice Parker, Guest Conductor

Recorded November 14, 1999 in the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts Concert Hall,
Washington, DC
Producer: Blanton Alspaugh
Engineer: John Newton
Edited and mastered at Soundmirror, Boston, Massachusetts
Orchestra Contractor: Pamela Lassell
Cover photo: © 2001 by Janet Martin

This Master Chorale of Washington extends special thanks to a generous anonymous friend of the Master Chorale for support in the production of this recording.

Other recordings by the Master Chorale of Washington: Christmas with the Master Chorale of Washington (Troy 353) and Holocaust Cantata by the Master Chorale Chamber Singers (Troy 352). Recordings under the Paul Hill Chorale name: Unequaled Praise (PHC9601), A Paul Hill Chorale Christmas (CRC2258) and Russia! (CRC 2230).

Made in USA.

Gothic Records

© 2001 Master Chorale of Washington, Inc. All rights reserved.
www.masterchorale.org

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