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Welcome to the SDG newsletter collection. You want to know what’s happening. We want to share our excitement with you about new and upcoming events. Periodically, we collect our news and send it out in printed form, but you can get it here quicker. Also, you can check here for back issues for info you missed.
Just click on any newsletter picture to see the full issue.
February 2012 newsletter
St. John Passion during Holy Week
Preparations for our second annual Chicago Bach Project concert are well underway, with rehearsals beginning in March. We are delighted to welcome a world-class roster of soloists for this year’s performance of Bach’s St. John Passion, along with some of Chicago’s top professional musicians, many of whom are associated with Lyric Opera of Chicago, Music of the Baroque, Grant Park Festival, Ars Viva, and music faculties of DePaul University and Wheaton College.
Given that last year’s Chicago Bach Project performance was named “One of the Top 10 Performances of 2011,” we expect this year’s concert to be a sell out. If you’re thinking about attending, now would be the time to get your tickets, to ensure the best seat selection!
Program Notes from the St. John Passion
South Dakota Is the Place to Be
(Kellogg premiere)
SDG Highlights
Board Updates
SDG Commissions to Premiere in Wales
(Byrar, Bannister premieres)
Wyner Psalm Recap
The CEO Search Is On
New Reviews of Our Beethoven
Missa Solemnis DVD
Dont's Miss This!
(St. Matthew Passion rebroadcast)
What's Ahead . . .
November 2011 newsletter
Sandström Premiere Transcends East Coast Storm
When composer Sven-David Sandström traveled from Sweden for the premiere of his a cappella choral work God Be Merciful at Westminster Choir College (Princeton, NJ), little did he—or Andrew Megill’s Kantorei choir—know what lay in store for them. Despite the wild weather brought on by a surprise early winter snowstorm, the concert went on, and Sandström’s work uplifted the spirits of the listeners with its sonorous chords and unique rhythmic textures.
A musical & visual feast!
When people start using such terms as “a performance for the ages,” “near life changing,” and “exquisite music-making all around,” our ears perk up. And that is exactly what people are saying about the performances captured on our new DVDs. See and hear for yourself.
Chicago Bach Project Tickets Now on Sale
Johann Sebastian Bach St. John Passion, Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Premiere of Have Mercy on Me, O God by Vache Sharafyan
Yehudi Wyner Psalm Premiere
South Dakota Symphony Premieres New Daniel Kellogg Commission
What’s happening at SDG . . .
CEO search underway, new intern, volunteers
What’s ahead . . .
September 2011 Newsletter
Announcing a Double Release in The Soli Deo Gloria Collection, October 25, 2011
We’re celebrating! Two long-awaited SDG DVDs, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis and Haydn’s The Creation, are now on their way to the SDG office, ready for you to enjoy and share. If you were fortunate enough to have seen either of these performances on the live Medici.tv broadcasts, you’ll understand why we’re so excited.
Looking Forward to Premiere of
Sandström Commission
SDG Commissions New Work by One of Armenia’s
Most Important Living Composers
Call for Choirs
GoodShop: Save & Support SDG at the Same Time
SDG in Transition
Announcing Chicago Bach Project 2012
MacMillan Recap
Board Updates
Bach’s St. Matthew Passion at St. Denis Festival
What's Ahead . . .
May 2011 Newsletter
MacMillan Visits Chicago for Premiere
Considered by many to be Scotland's greatest living composer, James MacMillan is making a rare Chicago appearance for the premiere of an SDG-commissioned choral work entitled Alpha and Omega. The event takes place on the campus of the University of Chicago in Rockefeller Memorial Chapel (5850 S. Woodlawn) on Saturday, June 4, 2011, at 4:30 p.m. James Kallembach, Director of Choral Activities at the Univeristy of Chicago, will conduct the Rockefeller Chapel Choir and the University of Chicago Motet Choir.
St. Matthew Passion Live Broadcast
Launch of 3-Year Pilot Program
SDG Makes Its Calvin College Debut
Premiere of Peter Bannister's Psalm 96
Board Updates
Did You Know?
What's Ahead . . .
February 2011 Newsletter
Chicago Bach Project Is Generating Huge Excitement!
The Chicago Bach Project launch date of April 20, 2011, is only a few months away! The excitement at the SDG office is running high as we get ready for what promises to be a milestone event in our 17-year history. The performance of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion at St. Vincent de Paul Parish, on the DePaul University campus in Chicago, is already gathering media attention. Interviews are taking place, articles are being written, press releases are going out.
Psalms Project: Full Steam Ahead
Chicago Bach Project Soloists
Redesigned with You in Mind
- A New Home on the Web
The Lost Son Recap
O Greening Branch Recap
Board Updates
September 2010 newsletter
The Sound of Angels?
The first of two fall premieres of SDG commissions, The Lost Son by Neal Harnly, takes place on Friday, November 5, 2010, with the renowned Indianapolis Children’s Choir under the direction of Henry Leck, at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Indianapolis, Indiana. For the composer, who chose the story of the Prodigal Son from the Book of Luke as the basis for the composition, writing the work was both a musical and a spiritual endeavor.
A Grand Statement
Pärt in Person!
Crescendo Institute Touches Hearts and Lives
August 2010 newsletter
A Song of Hope
Arvo Pärt’s signature “mystical mini¬malism” (NPR) and his haunting, slow-moving harmonies have made him one of the most prominent living composers of sacred music today. And that is good cause for the Vale of Glamorgan Festival in Wales to honor this Estonian composer’s 75th birthday in September with the most extensive celebration in the UK. SDG has been invited to co-sponsor the 2010 Festival, and we’re eagerly anticipating the premiere of Pärt’s In Spe (“In Hope”) on September 9th.
Passion & Purpose
The Power of Art
Meet a most inspiring man . . .
“Charitable Children”
“It’s a Wrap!”
What’s ahead . . .
June 2010 newsletter
Haydn’s Masterpiece: THE CREATION
Soli Deo Gloria is pleased to partner with Ideale Audience and Medici Arts to bring Franz Joseph Haydn’s masterpiece The Creation to an audience of millions through state-of-the-art media technology. On June 25, 2010, Maestro John Nelson will conduct Die Shöpfung live from Grote Kerk in Naarden—one of the oldest and most famous churches in the Netherlands.
First View of Missa Solemnis DVD
New Arvo Pärt Work
Peter Bannister Named Composer-in-Association
New Board Member
SDG in Full Swing for Upcoming Season
Peter Bannister Speaks from the Heart
Project Uplift: Making Music Ministry Happen
March 2010 newsletter
Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis
An audience of 2,000 gathered in Lisbon’s Gulbenkian Grand Auditorium for two performances of Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis last month. John Nelson led the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Gulbenkian Choir and soloists Tamara Wilson, Elizabeth DeShong, Nikolai Schukoff and Brindley Sherratt in a piece the conductor considers “one of the mountain peaks of the entire western classical tradition.” 3,400 people tuned in to the live video webcast on medici.tv, and an additional 50,000-70,000 viewers are expected over the next two months.
Haydn’s The Creation
Premiere of The Lost Son by Neal Harnly
Under construction
Upcoming Events
Preserve Me, O God by Daniel Kellogg
February 2012
“Music takes us out of the actual
and whispers to us dim secrets
that startle our wonder
as to who we are,
and for what, whence, and whereto.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson
Daniel Kellogg
South Dakota Is the Place to Be
On February 25 and 26, 2012, the South Dakota Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of SDG Board Member Maestro Delta David Gier, will present the world premiere of Daniel Kellogg’s Psalm cycle for orchestra and mezzo-soprano, From Everlasting to Everlasting.
November 2011
“Music is great if, at some moment,
the listener catches a glimpse of eternity
through the window of time.”
— Einojuhani Rautavaara
New DVDs from The Soli Deo Gloria Collection
Sacred masterworks filmed live in concert bring the power of music into your home and heart.
Beethoven Missa Solemnis
Haydn The Creation (Die Schöpfung)
Conducted by John Nelson
September 2011
“Music gives a soul to the universe,
wings to the mind,
flight to the imagination,
and life to everything.”
— Plato
Announcing the Chicago Bach Project,
April 4, 2012
Bach's St. John Passion
St. Vincent de Paul Church, Chicago
May 2011
“Music is not an escape from reality;
it is an adventure into the reality
of the world of the spirit.”
— Ethnomusicologist John Blacking
Premiere of Peter Bannister’s
Psalm 96
Elsbeth Shannon family with composer Peter Bannister
at the premiere of Psalm 96
February 2011
"Bach opens a vista to the universe.
After hearing him, people feeel
there is meaning to life after all."
— Helmut Walcha, blind German organist
who recorded Bach’s complete works twice
Psalms Project: Full Steam Ahead!
Peter Bannister named Psalms Project Program Director
September 2010
“The aim and final end of all music
should be none other
than the glory of God
and the refreshment of the soul.”
—Johann Sebastian Bach
"Crescendo Institutes
Touches Hearts and Lives"
Peter Bannister and Delta David Gier
at the premiere of Bannister's
Hermosura de Dios
August 2010
“There is nothing in the world
so much like prayer as music is.”
—William P. Merrill,
author, pastor, hymnwriter (1867-1954)
"Meet a Most Inspiring Man"
Bob Jones (left)
with Jean-Pierre Rampal
in the mid 1900s
June 2010
"SDG has the honor of having been solicited
to participate in Arvo Pärt's 75th birthday celebration ..."
"New Arvo Pärt Work"
Arvo Pärt (Photo: Universal Edition)
March 2010
“A beautiful setting of a wonderful text”
“Truth expressed in music is mighty”
“I felt absolutely transported
into the very presence of God”
—audience members at the premiere
of Preserve Me, O God
"Preserve Me, O God"
Poster for the premiere of
Preserve Me, O God
by Daniel Kellogg
