News & Updates
Fall 2024 Review — A Letter from the Artistic Director
December 13, 2024 — Dear Voce Chamber Singers Community,
Happy holidays and season’s greetings!
I’m delighted to share a few reflections with you on Voce’s 36th Season, VISIONARY, and offer a preview of upcoming programming to come in the new year.
A GROWING FAMILY
Our audience, volunteer, and singer roster are noticeably bigger this year. Record ticket sales including our first sold out performance since the pandemic, six new faces in the ensemble, and my personal favorite new Voce fan (my wife and I welcomed our daughter Alice to her first Voce concert this December!)
Board members remarked at our meeting this month that the post-concert receptions are starting to feel like a family reunion! As we build connections with our neighbors and friends, we are taking part in the undeniable community-building power of choral music.
A RENEWED PURPOSE
The idea behind entitling this season VISIONARY was to evoke our responsibility as a leading organization amongst our choral peers in the DC area. Musically this has taken many forms including performing groundbreaking repertoire by historically marginalized composers (see our recent recording of Nathaniel Dett’s cantata Chariot Jubilee). We have also deepened our artistry by exploring new artistic and musical challenges in works like Britten’s Rejoice in the Lamb.
On April 4th and 6th, our musical journey continues with the program Herstory which will highlight phenomenal works by female composers throughout history. The concert will also feature a world premiere by Virginia-based composer, Emily Mason. This commission was made possible by generous contributions from our Voce Alumni as part of last year’s 35th anniversary concert.
THE MOST WONDERFUL TIME
One word that comes to mind when I think of Voce Chamber Singers: FUN!
We have had so much fun this fall, between exploring new venues (Church of the Holy Cross, Dunn Loring), showcasing our incredibly talented leaders (Neil Weston, organist and keyboard artist extraordinaire), and sharing each Monday evening together in community and music-making.
If it’s been a while since you’ve connected with this community or if you’re looking to help us in bringing visionary choral music to our community, please consider joining us this spring at Herstory or the Spring Soirée. Our programs are diverse, spiritually enriching, and full of joy!
If you feel inspired, take the next step: bring a friend, volunteer at a concert, or send an end-of-year contribution that will go directly toward supporting music in your community.
THANK YOU AND HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
Most of all, THANK YOU!
Your presence and support have enabled Voce Chamber Singers to bring joy, healing, and beauty to all who encounter our organization. In return we pledge, (in the words of Maestro Leonard Bernstein) “to make music more intensely, more beautifully, and more devotedly than ever before.”
Warmest wishes,
David Mann
Artistic Director
New Commission for April 2025
August 25, 2024 — Voce is excited to commission a new choral work by composer Emily Mason to be premiered at April 2025 concert Herstory.
Herstory will shine a light on one thousand years of repertoire by female composers, including medieval chant, Renaissance madrigals and motets, 19th century chamber music, 20th century spirituals, and contemporary anthems. Emily Mason is an award-winning composer, harpist, pianist, organist, and sound and video engineer in the Washington, DC area with over eighteen years of performance experience. The commission was funded with the generous donations of Voce alumni singers and board members in honor of Voce’s the 35th Anniversary.
Voce Awarded Three FY25 Grants
August 1, 2024 — Voce was awarded three grants for the 2024-2025 season! As only one third of Voce’s budget is covered by ticket sales, grants and donations are hugely important to continue the growth and high-level musicianship that Voce is committed to. The first of the grants was awarded by the Community Foundation for Northern Virginia Ross-Roberts Fund for the Arts. This is the second year in a row that Voce has received funding from Community Foundation and only four total small organizations were awarded grants. Voce also received Operating Support grants for small organizations from ArtsFairfax and the Virginia Commission for the Arts, in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts. Thank you to Voce’s grant writing team who worked hard to get this support!
Celebrating our 35th Anniversary: Season 2023-2024 in Review
June 1, 2024 — Thank you for celebrating with us this year. See what all we accomplished in our 2023-2024 season!
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New Heights through Community
$10,000 raised to help sustain the future of Voce by supporters at our Spring Soirée and through our online auction
An outstanding THREE consecutive seasons of increased ticket sales and donations since returning to in-person programming in 2021
Welcoming our incredible new Keyboard Artist, Neil Weston!
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New Heights through Innovation
Welcoming back Carol Hunter and Ken Nafziger to lead the Voce Alumni Choir
$2,000 raised by our Voce alumni to commission a new work by an underrepresented composer for next season
Performing a new commission, cantatas, gospel, jazz, spirituals, oratorios, and more!
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New Heights through Diversity
Inclusive programming of music by women, BIPOC, and LGBTQ+ individuals including our October program which featured 100 years of choral music by black choral composers.
Nomination for 2023 Greater Washington Choral Excellence Award for “Best DEI Programming”
Uplifting female voices through works by Florence Price, Undine Smith Moore, Margaret Bonds, and more!
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New Heights through Excellence
Performing at major venues including the Hylton Performing Arts Center in Manassas and Capital One Hall THE VAULT in Tysons Corner.
Nominated for 2024 Greater Washington Choral Excellence Award for “Best Chamber Choir”
Recognized as a national finalist for the American Prize in Choral Performance - Community Division!
Two Years of “Ovation” Award Nominations
May 1, 2024 — Voce is honored to be nominated two years in a row for The Greater Washington D.C. Choral Excellence “Ovation” Award, hosted by Choralis. The 2023 nomination was for “Best DEI Programming” and the 2024 nomination was for “Best Chamber Choir”. “The Greater Washington D.C. Area Choral Excellence (“Ovation”) Awards were inaugurated by Choralis in 2010 to celebrate the achievements of the DC area’s rich choral community.”
Voce Chamber Singers Receives Grant to Support Local Community
April 25, 2023 — Voce Chamber Singers is proud to announce that we are a recipient of The Community Foundation for Northern Virginia’s grant program.
The Community Foundation has awarded $763,969 in grants to 44 local organizations through its 2023 Community Investment Funds (CIF), Environment Fund, and Ross-Roberts Fund for the Arts, helping support broad-based needs and address complex social issues across the region. This work addresses two of the core pillars of the Community Foundation’s strategic work— to build community resilience and advance social and economic mobility for all of Northern Virginia’s residents.
As the Community Foundation’s core grants program, funds are invested in organizations serving the Northern Virginia community in the areas of Aging, Arts, Child and Youth Development, Education, Environment, Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, Mental Health, Military Personnel and Families, and Safety Net to Support Basic Needs.
This represents the largest ever discretionary grants cycle in the Community Foundation’s history, and an increase of about $100,000 in awards since 2022.
The growth of this discretionary grants program is possible due to the Permanent Fund for Northern Virginia, a permanent endowment that the Community Foundation is developing to support our region.
American Prize in Choral Performance — Community Division, 2023
June 15, 2023 — Voce Chamber Singers was announced as a finalist for the national choral competition, the American Prize, in the community choir division. See all 2023 finalists here.
“The American Prize National Nonprofit Competitions in the Performing Arts is the nation's most comprehensive series of contests in the performing arts. The American Prize is unique in scope and structure, designed to recognize and reward the best performing artists, directors, ensembles and composers in the United States at professional, college/university, community and high school levels, based on submitted recordings. Now in its thirteenth year, The American Prize was founded in 2010 and is awarded annually in many areas of the performing arts. Thousands of artists from all fifty states have derived benefit from their participation in the contests of The American Prize, representing literally hundreds of communities and arts organizations across the nation.”
Thank you for joining our 2022-23 Season, “A Year of Renewal”!
Thrilling New Recordings
Thanks to our experienced team of audio engineers and video editors, our performance videos this year were extremely effective and received more than one thousand views within the very first week of posting. Internationally renowned composer Jake Runestad shared our recording of his composition “Come to the Woods” on Earth Day 2023. This interactive and easily accessible content has expanded Voce’s organizational reach and renewed the enthusiasm of our audiences in between our in-person events.
June 1, 2023 — You, our audiences, volunteers, donors, and supporters, made this season a ringing success. We couldn’t have done it without you!
Read on for highlights from the year:
Praiseworthy Performances
In 2023, Voce was a nominee for “Best DEI Programming” for the Greater Washington Area Choral Excellence Awards. Voce was also recognized this year as a finalist for the American Prize in Choral Performance, among a short list of community choirs across the United States recognized for their outstanding performances during the 2022-2023 season.
Outreach Performances
Voce continued our outreach work in our community this year by offering a free President’s Day weekend performance at a senior living center in Fairfax, VA. This annual tradition enables our singers to interact with individuals in memory care or assisted living while making meaningful connections through popular tunes from by-gone eras.
We also continued our tradition of outreach performances at the Willard Hotel in Washington D.C. performing carols and leading sing-alongs with guests visiting the nation’s capital during December.
Our 2023 Youth Choral Festival took place on April 15, 2023 at Centreville High School. Over 150 students from five visiting Northern Virginia High Schools rehearsed and performed alongside our adult ensemble in a one-day, intergenerational choral festival.
Our Festival was offered at no cost to the students and included sheet music, expert clinicians, lunch, and an open performance at the end of the day that was professionally recorded for friends and family. This event was made possible due to a supporting grant from Virginia Commission for the Arts.
Stay Tuned: We’ll be back in October with more innovative programming for the 35th anniversary season of Voce Chambers Singers!
With gratitude,
David Mann, Artistic Director
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