GRAFTON — The 85-member River Singers Chorus will perform an eclectic concert of world music on Saturday, May 30, at 7:30 p.m., at The White Church in Grafton.
The River Singers, a multi-generational community choir led by Mary Cay Brass, is in its 23rd year of singing a variety of traditional music from many cultural and musical traditions.
Brass will be joined by guest conductor, singer, and virtuoso gospel piano player, Dr. Kathy Bullock of Berea, Ky.
Bullock has been a professor of music for 23 years at Berea College, where she directs the Black Music Ensemble, a 70-voice choir that specializes in performance of African-American sacred music. She performs, lectures, and leads workshops in the United States and internationally on music and culture of the African diaspora.
This will be her sixth residency with the River Singers, teaching the choir a set of gospel songs that are then performed with the rest of the repertoire that the choir has studied this session.
The River Singers typically includes songs from Eastern Europe, as that is of particular interest to Brass who, earlier in her career, was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship to study in the former Yugoslavia and regularly leads Village Harmony summer singing seminars in the Balkans. This concert will feature a Croatian “klapa” song, or love song, from the Adriatic coast.
The choir will also sing a Bosnian “sevdalinka,” or love song, from the time of the Turkish occupation of the Balkans. This song is in the dynamic 9/8 rhythm and accompanied by Brass on accordion, Walter Slowinski on clarinet, Richie Davis on percussion, and Joe Blumenthal on bass.
The choir will sing songs from several English language traditions: a lively English West Gallery song from the 19th century, accompanied by the choir's in-house band; the blues song “In My Time of Dying”; the bluegrass gospel song “On the Sea of Life,” backed by Donald Saaf, guitar and Andy Davis, banjo; and two songs from the early New England shape note tradition.
The River Singer's smaller ensemble will perform a diverse set of songs, including the playful Italian Renaissance song, “El Grillo” (the cricket) by Josquin des Prez; a Bulgarian orthodox chant; and a theatrical piece “Fa Sol La” by the Canadian trio, Finest Kind, about the unique experience of attending a New England shape note sing.
Every River Singer concert benefits a local or global peace program. This one will benefit the Conflict Transformation Across Cultures Program at the School for International Training in Brattleboro.