University of South Dakota Chamber Singers: I Carry Your Heart
Navona Records

The performances on I Carry Your Heart are notable for many reasons, though two in particular stand out. The first has to do, obviously, with the remarkably expressive vocalizing of the University of South Dakota Chamber Singers, which, led by conductor David Holdhusen, maximizes the emotional potency of the recording's eighteen pieces; the second is less obvious but no less important, namely repertoire. Classical selections by the likes of Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms are eschewed for an enriching set-list centering on folk songs from around the world, African-American spirituals, and even a pair of recent works by young composers. Culled from performances given by the singers during 2016-18, the recording testifies to the ensemble's choral artistry while also highlighting the resplendent tonal colours the group appears so effortlessly capable of generating. Put simply, theirs is a thrilling and sonorous sound.

If the singing is marked by the kind of vitality one associates with youth, so it should be: the group is comprised of graduate and undergraduate students selected via audition from the University of South Dakota student body. Enhancing the largely a cappella presentation is judiciously placed instrumental accompaniment (a muffled pounding by percussionist Max Whitehead in “Keep Your Lamps” and violin playing by Marty Balmer and Alexa Worley in the folk hymn “Idumea,” to cite two instances); on a number of songs, a soloist steps forth from the ensemble (e.g., Elizabeth Wensmann in “Remember”), and that too allows for a more varied listening experience.

The spirit is repeatedly roused by the performances, with jubilant settings such as “Tshotsholoza,” a Rhodesian miners' song whose celebratory tone starts the album on a high, and “Muie Rendera,” a folksong from Northeastern Brazil, seducing the senses. The singers also venture to Sweden for the traditional dancing song “Och jungfrun hon gar i ringen,” India for the deep raga “Dwijavanthi,” and embellish their voices with handclaps during “Ain't That-a Rockin'.” In fact, some pieces are so infectious, you could find yourself literally responding to a line voiced by the ensemble in the African-American spiritual “Sit Down Servant,” “My soul's so happy that it can't sit down.” In these uptempo settings, one's also presented with repeated examples of the ensemble's marvelous command of unison singing and polyphony.

Not everything's so boisterous. Zander Fick's stirring, oft-hushed “Die Onse Vader,” an Afrikaans treatment of the Lord's Prayer, is naturally prayerful, while Kenneth and Kirsten Lampl's “Dirshu Adonai” (Seek the Lord and His Strength), a meditation sung in Hebrew, captivates the listener with incantatory supplications. Two of the album's most beautiful choral settings come from Connor Koppin (b. 1991), whose moving treatment of E. E. Cummings' poem “i carry your heart” is as emotionally affecting as its title promises, and Nick Myers (b. 1987), whose magnificent “Jenny” soars in the singers' hands. Also included are three haunting works by the Chamber Singers' composer-in-residence Jonny Priano, “Lullaby,” “Sicut Cervus,” and “Remember,” and an equally powerful piece by Frank Ticheli, “There Will Be Rest,” that sets his music to text by American poet Sara Teasdale.

January 2019