A wonderful month ahead with lots of music-making! The first rehearsals have begun for the VocalEssence Chorus & Ensemble Singers. Osmo Vänskä comes to rehearsal next week as the Ensemble Singers prepare for the Finland concerts with Osmo on clarinet and Sara Pajunen on fiddle. Don’t miss one of these September 24 concerts at the American Swedish Institute!

Artistic Director Philip Brunelle will lead the first of the season’s Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) sessions on September 21 (again Finland related) with Mark Sedio as they introduce choral music of Finland and its unique history. On September 23 they will offer a free afternoon introduction to this music, and then the 49th season opening on September 24!

Associate Conductor and Education Program Manager G. Phillip Shoultz, III will be leading teachers at the VocalEssence WITNESS and ¡Cantaré! Teacher Orientations at the end of September, and he also is in discussions with a local healthcare facility to test out the VocalEssence Lullaby Project with mothers with postpartum depression. More to come!

The VocalEssence ReMix program, working with the VocalEssence Ensemble Singers and four young, talented composers, continues on October 5 as we prepare for a November presentation at the American Choral Directors Association of Minnesota annual State Conference.

Our VocalEssence ¡Cantaré! composers arrive for their first visit in October and a chance to meet the schools they will be working with, and then Philip Brunelle leaves for Seoul, Korea to conduct the Ansan City Choir—Korea’s TOP professional choir in an all-American program, including a salute to Dominick Argento on his 90th birthday!

A wonderful and music-filled month!