An innovative choir based in Irvine and led by Brandon Elliott (pictured), Choral Arts Initiative (CAI) has been an org to watch for a few years now. Their programming is creative, they support new works and nurture their singers, and their PREMIERE|Project Festival (now accepting participant apps for 2023) is a celebration of what modern classical composition can be.
With yesterday’s announcement, CAI shows the same spirit of adventure with an ambitious lineup of three programs (plus the festival) that should be on your “save the date” list.
Artistic Director Brandon Elliott and Choral Arts Initiative (CAI) will present their most ambitious season to date, holding quarterly concerts that explore all facets of the human experience. …
The southern California based ensemble – recognized as a champion of new music as a recipient of the American Prize in Choral Performance and an ASCAP/Chorus America Award for Adventurous Programming – will present four quarterly concerts in its 11th season, each exploring a different dimension of the human experience.
Choral Arts Initiative’s season opens November 6, 2022, with, “Home”, a concert anchored by the world premiere of composer Dale Trumbore’s The Opposites Game, which asks an almost unanswerable question: “What is the opposite of a gun?”. “Home” also includes the world premiere of Tupelo Poems by Dylan Trần and the West Coast premieres of Migration by Michael Gilbertson and To Propagate a Home by Ayanna Woods. Following on March 5, 2023 is the West Coast premiere of Kile Smith’s Canticle and on May 21, 2023, a concert featuring Rex Isenberg’s Messiahs: False and True, along with the West Coast premieres of Joel Thompson’s Hold Fast to Dreams, B.E. Boykin’s Holding the Light, Ariel Sol Bertulfo Schwartz’s Willow Poem, and the a cappella world premiere of Derrick Skye’s Glimpse Elation. The season will close with CAI’s annual PREMIERE | Project Festival, during which selected emerging composers come to finalize a composition in a workshop setting. The concluding concert includes a live and recorded public premiere of each composer’s work.
