Choral Music

LONDON - British conductor Richard Hickox, who made a particular mark in opera and choral music with orchestras around the world, died Sunday of a heart attack in a hotel in Cardiff, Wales. He was 60. Mr. Hickox had been due to conduct the new English National Opera production of Ralph Vaughan Williams's "Riders to the Sea," which opens on Thursday. He was musical director of Opera Australia, associate guest conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, founder and music director of the City of London Sinfonia, co-director of the period instrument group Collegium...

Women Singing Out!, a chorus that tackles complex and difficult topics through music, is focusing on domestic violence awareness this season. The group performs Saturdayat First Church in Wenham in collaboration with HAWC (Healing Abuse Working For Change), based in Salem. It also presents a concert next Sunday at Christ Episcopal Church in Portsmouth, N.H., in collaboration with A Safe Place. Artistic director Claudia Frost, former director of choral music in the Hamilton-Wenham schools, has chosen music that addresses the needs of woman who have lost their...

The Westwood Interfaith Thanksgiving Service will start at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 20 at St. Denis Church, 157 Washington St. The entire community is invited to join in the evening of worship, choral music, and fellowship that is hosted annually by a different member congregation of the Westwood Interfaith Council. They include First Baptist of Westwood, First Parish of Westwood, St. Denis, St. John's Episcopal Church, St. Margaret Mary's, and Temple Beth David. The Christian Science and Muslim communities also participate.

LIFE AS WE KNOW IT: Stoneham Theatre is staging "The Full Monty," a musical about unemployed mill workers who chose an unusual way to improve their professional and personal lives, through May 6. Based on the book by Terrence McNally, with music and lyrics by David Yazbek, the play is adapted from the 1997 British film and set in Buffalo. It is directed by Caitlyn Lowans, the theater's director of education, and has an almost exclusively female production team overseeing the six jobless men who become striptease performers.

The following was submitted by Tufts University: The Tufts University Department of Music presents an evening of classic and modern choral music from England and New England with Tufts Chamber Singers, under the direction of Jamie Kirsch. The performance will take place in the Distler Performance Hall at the Perry and Marty Granoff Music Center on Sunday, March 11, 2012 at 8 p.m.  The evening will feature Randall Thompson's The Peaceable Kingdom as well as works by William Byrd, William Billings, Thomas Weelkes, Benjamin Britten, and...

Women Singing Out!, a chorus that tackles complex and difficult topics through music, is focusing on domestic violence awareness this season. The group performs Saturdayat First Church in Wenham in collaboration with HAWC (Healing Abuse Working For Change), based in Salem. It also presents a concert next Sunday at Christ Episcopal Church in Portsmouth, N.H., in collaboration with A Safe Place. Artistic director Claudia Frost, former director of choral music in the Hamilton-Wenham schools, has chosen music that addresses the needs of...

CAMBRIDGE -- On Friday night, Boston Secession, the 24-voice professional chorus, pulled off a neat trick: a concert dedicated to "Minimalism in Choral Music" that contained very little actual minimalism. Artistic director Jane Ring Frank talked up the history of the style at length, but the music was often something else. Take Gavin Bryars's work "And so ended Kant's traveling in this world," which received a beautifully precise American premiere. Bryars is a sometime minimalist, but this lovely 1997 setting describing the German philosopher's last days is more an austere echo of the...

LENOX — In his visit to Tanglewood this summer to replace the recovering James Levine, Michael Tilson Thomas has been swept into the full range of campus activities, working not only with the Boston Symphony Orchestra but also with the students of the Tanglewood Music Center. Both facets of his work were on view this weekend, when he deftly led the BSO Friday night in a reprise of its Stravinsky-Mozart program from this year’s Symphony Hall season, and on Saturday drew energized performances from the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra and gathered vocal forces in...

CHICAGO - Jessy Dixon, a singer and songwriter who introduced his energetic style of gospel music to wider audiences by serving as pop singer Paul Simon's opening act, died yesterday. He was 73. Miriam Dixon said her brother died at his Chicago home. She said he had been ill, but declined to provide additional details. During a more than 50-year career, Mr. Dixon wrote songs for several popular singers, including jazz and rhythm and blues singer Randy Crawford. He later wrote songs performed by Cher, Diana Ross, Natalie Cole, and Amy Grant.

LIFE AS WE KNOW IT: Stoneham Theatre is staging "The Full Monty," a musical about unemployed mill workers who chose an unusual way to improve their professional and personal lives, through May 6. Based on the book by Terrence McNally, with music and lyrics by David Yazbek, the play is adapted from the 1997 British film and set in Buffalo. It is directed by Caitlyn Lowans, the theater's director of education, and has an almost exclusively female production team overseeing the six jobless men who become striptease performers.

The following was submitted by Tufts University: The Tufts University Department of Music presents an evening of classic and modern choral music from England and New England with Tufts Chamber Singers, under the direction of Jamie Kirsch. The performance will take place in the Distler Performance Hall at the Perry and Marty Granoff Music Center on Sunday, March 11, 2012 at 8 p.m.  The evening will feature Randall Thompson's The Peaceable Kingdom as well as works by William Byrd, William Billings, Thomas Weelkes, Benjamin Britten, and...

The Westwood Interfaith Thanksgiving Service will start at 7:30 p.m. on Nov. 20 at St. Denis Church, 157 Washington St. The entire community is invited to join in the evening of worship, choral music, and fellowship that is hosted annually by a different member congregation of the Westwood Interfaith Council. They include First Baptist of Westwood, First Parish of Westwood, St. Denis, St. John's Episcopal Church, St. Margaret Mary's, and Temple Beth David. The Christian Science and Muslim communities also participate.

CHICAGO - Jessy Dixon, a singer and songwriter who introduced his energetic style of gospel music to wider audiences by serving as pop singer Paul Simon's opening act, died yesterday. He was 73. Miriam Dixon said her brother died at his Chicago home. She said he had been ill, but declined to provide additional details. During a more than 50-year career, Mr. Dixon wrote songs for several popular singers, including jazz and rhythm and blues singer Randy Crawford. He later wrote songs performed by Cher, Diana Ross, Natalie Cole, and Amy Grant.

LENOX — In his visit to Tanglewood this summer to replace the recovering James Levine, Michael Tilson Thomas has been swept into the full range of campus activities, working not only with the Boston Symphony Orchestra but also with the students of the Tanglewood Music Center. Both facets of his work were on view this weekend, when he deftly led the BSO Friday night in a reprise of its Stravinsky-Mozart program from this year’s Symphony Hall season, and on Saturday drew energized performances from the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra and gathered vocal forces in Mahler’s epic Third...

LONDON - British conductor Richard Hickox, who made a particular mark in opera and choral music with orchestras around the world, died Sunday of a heart attack in a hotel in Cardiff, Wales. He was 60. Mr. Hickox had been due to conduct the new English National Opera production of Ralph Vaughan Williams's "Riders to the Sea," which opens on Thursday. He was musical director of Opera Australia, associate guest conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, founder and music director of the City of London Sinfonia, co-director of the period...

CAMBRIDGE -- On Friday night, Boston Secession, the 24-voice professional chorus, pulled off a neat trick: a concert dedicated to "Minimalism in Choral Music" that contained very little actual minimalism. Artistic director Jane Ring Frank talked up the history of the style at length, but the music was often something else. Take Gavin Bryars's work "And so ended Kant's traveling in this world," which received a beautifully precise American premiere. Bryars is a sometime minimalist, but this lovely 1997 setting describing the German philosopher's last days is more an austere echo...

NEWPORT, R.I. - The romance of the season comes alive this weekend at Holiday Evenings at The Breakers. The historic 70-room Italian Renaissance-style Newport villa gets lavishly dressed for the event, with evergreens, wreaths, fresh flowers, and 19th-century-style ornaments creating a spectacular display. Visitors can leisurely wander the Gilded Age manse and enjoy the period silver, china, and various mannequins dolled up in Victorian holiday fashions. The elegant evening features a sampling of holiday sweets, along with sips of eggnog and warm cider.

Boston University presented Haydn's "The Creation" Monday night, and it fielded an interesting team of soloists: a faculty member, a recent alum, and three new graduate students. Soprano Michelle Johnson hails from Pearland, Texas, but in her, Boston may be developing its next diva. She has the voice, the presence, and the presence of mind for it. Even when she and the orchestra briefly parted company in one aria, she kept right on going. Johnson's timbre is vibrantly luscious, but she kept it focused and within Haydn's stylistic frame; she probably has a wider range...