Michiana’s Premier Vocal Chamber Ensemble
Winners of the 2004 ASCAP Chorus America Award for Adventurous Programming

Our Nineteenth Season

Christmas at Loretto Beautiful Music for the Season with David Eicher, organist Sunday, December 16, 2007, 7:30 p.m. Church of Our Lady of Loretto Saint Mary’s College

Cary Boyce

Axel Theimer

The Singing o’ the Green Choral Music from Ireland in Honor of St. Patrick’s Day with special guests Kennedy’s Kitchen and the Culver Academy Choir, Stacey Warren, director Sunday, March 16, 2008, 7:30 p.m. O’Laughlin Auditorium – Moreau Center for the Arts Saint Mary’s College

Two Choirs, One Voice with the Heartland Chamber Chorale of Fort Wayne Robert Nance, Music Director and David Eicher, organist Sunday, May 18, 2008, 7:30 p.m. Church of Our Lady of Loretto Saint Mary’s College Saturday, May 31, 2008, 8:00 p.m. and Sunday, June 1, 2008, 4:00 p.m. Plymouth Congregational Church Fort Wayne, Indiana

The award-winning CD, Christmas at Loretto: Twentieth Century Music for the Season is still available.
Also available: the critically acclaimed CD Millennium, Choral Music of Today , featuring exclusive recordings of new music.

The South Bend Chamber Singers, an ensemble-in-residence at Saint Mary’s College, was founded in 1989. The members have extensive musical backgrounds, but their current professions encompass a wide variety of fields. The choir draws its members from throughout north central Indiana and southwestern Michigan. The ensemble concentrates on works by living composers, but its repertoire includes traditional compositions and unusual and complex arrangements. They have performed with the Chicago Chamber Orchestra, the South Bend Symphony Orchestra, Germany’s Chamber Orchestra of the Rhine, the Avalon, Cavani, and Chester String Quartets, the Walker Chapel Brass, and the NIU Steel Band. From 1994 to 2001, the Chamber Singers were featured annually on The First Art, heard nationally on over 275 public and commercial radio stations. They have performed on area concert series in LaPorte and Warsaw, Indiana and Niles and Albion, Michigan, and were invited to give the opening concert for the Indiana Choral Directors Association summer conventions in 1993 and 1997. They were also selected to perform for the Central Division Convention of the American Choral Directors Association in 1996 (Cincinnati) and 2002 (Chicago). In 2000, the Singers were one of five finalists for the prestigious Margaret Hillis Award for Choral Excellence, given annually by Chorus America. Since 1992 their efforts have been rewarded by annual grants from the Indiana Arts Commission, and in 2004 they won the ASCAP/Chorus America Award for Adventurous Programming.

Nancy Menk, Music Director, holds the Mary Lou Morris and Judd Leighton Chair in Music at Saint Mary’s College, Notre Dame, Indiana. She also serves as Music Director of the Northwest Indiana Symphony Orchestra Chorus. She holds the B.S. and M.A. degrees in Music Education from Indiana University of Pennsylvania, and the M.M. and D.M.A. degrees in Choral Conducting from the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music. She has conducted high school choirs in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where she founded the Pittsburgh Youth Chorus which performed annually with the Pittsburgh Youth Symphony Orchestra. Her teachers have included Earl Rivers, Elmer Thomas, Helmuth Rilling, and Teri Murai. She is Editor of the Saint Mary’s College Choral Series, a distinctive series of select new music for women's voices published by Earthsongs of Corvallis, Oregon. Dr. Menk serves regularly as a guest conductor and choral adjudicator throughout the United States.

Kathleen Keasey attended Millikin University and received a Bachelor of Music degree from Oberlin College in piano performance and a Master of Music degree from the University of Illinois in piano performance. She served eleven years as choral accompanist at Penn High School. She received her teaching license from Indiana University at South Bend and taught high school choirs at LaSalle High School in South Bend for two years and for four years at Northridge High School in Middlebury, Indiana where her concert choir placed in the ISSMA State Finals. She has accompanied and served as music director for musicals both at the high school level and at the Firefly Festival. Kathleen teaches private piano lessons in her home studio and is Treasurer of the South Bend Area Music Teachers Association. She is currently serving as the Music Director at Unity Church of Peace in South Bend. At the University of Notre Dame, Kathleen has taught piano and accompanied opera rehearsals, performance classes and voice recitals.

David Eicher served Chamber Singers for 19 years as accompanist and assistant director. He has been organist and music director at churches in LaPorte and Mishawaka, Indiana, and until recently, was the Interim Executive Director of the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians, and the Accompanist for the Northwest Indiana Symphony Chorus. David holds degrees in organ and church music from Manchester College and Valparaiso University. He currently serves as President of The Hymn Society in the United States and Canada, and also holds professional memberships in the Presbyterian Association of Musicians, the American Guild of English Handbell Ringers, the American Choral Directors Association, the American Guild of Organists, and the Guild of Carillonneurs in North America. In December 2007, David was named editor of the forthcoming Presbyterian hymnal, and consequently moved to Louisville, Kentucky. He will return as guest organist for our May, 2008 concert.

Donations to South Bend Chamber Singers are always welcome. Now you can make a donation online with your credit card using the secure Google checkout system.

Visit these related web pages:

• ChoralNet
• Saint Mary’s College
• Thanks to the Michiana Freenet for a home!

The South Bend Chamber Singers gratefully acknowledges support from Indiana Arts Commission and Saint Mary’s College.