Winnipeg singers join Accent Singers in choral event of the season

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This article was published 23/10/2023 (787 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A Steinbach audience will have the chance to take part in the choral event of the season as The Winnipeg Singers bring their 24-voice choir to the city, where they’ll perform at an event that will also feature the community’s own Accent Singers.

Led by artistic director and conductor Yuri Klaz, the Winnipeg Singers are a professional choir that will host Icons & Incense, choral concertos of the Orthodox tradition.

The event will feature an exploration of the Orthodox choral concerto from Vasily Titov (1650) to Georgy Sviridov (1915).

They will also present a modern concerto by Canadian composer Stephanie Martin, commissioned by the Winnipeg Singers.

Yuri Klaz boasts international experience, beginning in at the St Petersburg State Conservatory.

He has led the Chamber Choir of the Karelian Art Centre in Petrozavodsk and took the choir on tours in Germany, Finland, Estonia, Ireland, and Norway.

He received the prestigious title “Honour Artist of Russia” in 1995 by decree of President Boris Yeltzin and came to Canada in 2000.

In 2006 he made his debut as conductor of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra and the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra.

He became the artistic director and conductor of The Winnipeg Singers in 2003.

The guest choir will be none other than local choir Accent Singers, formerly the Accent Women’s Ensemble.

Directed by Meredith Hutchinson and accompanied by Annalee Schellenberg, the choir changed from a women’s ensemble to a men’s and women’s choir this year.

Hutchinson said she knew the choir would increase in size from the 30 voices they had last year, but even she wasn’t prepared for the level of interest.

“I knew it would increase a bit as I opened it up to the male voices,” she said. “We are now sitting at about 70 singers, so we barely fit into our rehearsal studio anymore.

Not only did the choir attract more men, but Hutchinson said they ended up with more women than ever before as well.

“It’s been a fun challenge,” she said. “I didn’t see it growing so big, so fast.”

Accent Singers will perform a variety of pieces in a four or five song set.

“The goal was just to find a few songs that we could get ready in a very short time span as we mainly are used to being able to have all the way until January to get our music ready,” she said.

Guests can look forward to sacred, choral classical and some modern examples including a mash-up of a U2 song.

“We’re kind of all over the map because we only have a set of four or five, so we really want to give a lot of variety and give the audience a sense of our vocal range as well as the kind of variety we like to offer in our music,” she said.

For Hutchinson, it’s a special feeling as before moving to Steinbach, she was part of the Winnipeg Singers.

She said the audience is in for a treat.

“It will be nice to hear a really small professional choir that we do not get to hear on a regular basis and then we have our big, booming, local choir new SATB (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) choir and I think the audience is in for a really fun concert and a nice range of repertoire and abilities,” she said. “I think it’s a really great ticket price to hear two really solid choirs.”

The concert will take place at 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Oct. 25 at the Steinbach Evangelical Mennonite Church in Steinbach.

Tickets are $10 and are only available at the door.