Orpheus Chamber Singers offering excellent recorded program online, for free
Led by founding director Donald Krehbiel, the choir performed a mix of motets from the 16th and 20th centuries.
Artistic director Donald Krehbiel and the Orpheus Chamber Singers lead the audience in a carol at Custer Road United Methodist Church in Plano on Dec. 14, 2017.(Anja Schlein / Special Contributor)
COVID-19 restrictions have kept the Orpheus Chamber Singers, an acclaimed professional chamber choir in Dallas, from giving a live concert in over a year. But the ensemble has reached its devoted following by offering video recordings on its website.
The latest performance, “Lamentations and Meditations,” was sung by 12 masked and socially-distanced voices in St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church. Led by founding director Donald Krehbiel, who’ll step down from his position in December, the 40-minute program mixed together 16th- and 20th-century motets for the Christian season of Lent and Holy Week.
A holiday gift: Watch this Orpheus Chamber Singers Christmas concert online for free
Recorded at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church, the program includes traditional carols and Benjamin Britten’s “A Ceremony of Carols.”
The Orpheus Chamber Singers perform their Christmas program at St. Thomas Aquinas Catholic Church on Dec. 21, 2019, in Dallas.(Robert W. Hart / Special Contributor)
The Orpheus Chamber Singers reliably serves up its popular Christmas program at area churches this time of year.
But amid the coronavirus pandemic, with worries about choral singing as a viral spreader not to mention large audiences this year’s Christmas concert will be virtual, released online Thursday.