Students sing with soul in IU choirs

Students who loved to sing before college need not give up their passions for vocal performance. IU's choral department offers a variety of opportunities for both music and non-music majors to display their talents. \nThe choral department allows students from all majors to participate in its auditions each semester. During the audition process, students are divided into 13 different choirs based on skill level and voice type. Many choirs specialize in a specific music type which requires a certain type of singer. \nDavid Villanueva, administrative director of the choral conducting department, said many students request to be placed in specific choirs based on their musical tastes. \n"I don't think that there is one strong favorite among the choirs," Villanueva said.\nChoral department chair Jan Harrington, who recently celebrated his 30th anniversary of conducting at IU, said the choral department has expanded its specialty choirs in the past 10 years. \n"We can offer the students a more intensive experience in a certain kind of music that they might be interested in," Harrington said.\nHarrington conducts University Singers, IU's oldest continuing choir in the School of Music. Harrington said that many of the choir's members were upper-classmen or graduate students and that the members often went on to have professional music careers.\n"University Singers tends to have a wide range of vocal color available to it because of the nature of the singers that are in it, because of their experience," Harrington said. "It's a choir with more experience."\nUniversity Singers has approximately 30 members and performs a variety of music types, from early music to contemporary. Harrington said that other choirs differ in that they focus on a specific music type. For example, Pro Arte Singers focuses on early Renaissance music, while Contemporary Vocal Ensemble sings works from the 20th century. \nThe conductors have different approaches to teaching their choirs based on the types of music they perform. Mary Goetze, director of International Vocal ensemble, said her choir doesn't always use sheet music to learn the parts and often learns through hearing the music. This semester the choir will be coached via Internet link up by Marlui Miranda from the Amazon. Miranda has been working with Brazilians to collect native music which she has arranged and written for performance. \n"It's a way of bringing the cultures together so that the students have an experience with someone from this culture," Goetze said.\nThe cultural aspects of music are also stressed in African-American Choral Ensemble, conducted by James Mumford. Music sung in this choir is written by African Americans about their life experiences. Mumford said that all students are encouraged to participate in the choir. \n"We have students from a wide variety of ethnic groups and religions," Mumford said.\nChoir concerts are usually open to the public and free. The next concert will be presented by Symphonic Choir at 8 p.m. Thursday in Auer Hall. They will perform Franz Schubert's Hymnus and den Heiligen Geist and Anton Bruckner's Mass in E Minor. \nA complete list of choir concerts and information about becoming involved with the choirs can be found at www.music.indiana.edu-/som/choral/index.htm. \n-- Contact staff writer Jennica Schultz at jwschult@indiana.edu