Ouachita’s Division of Music presents the Ouachita Singers, Women’s Chorus in concert Oct. 8

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The Ouachita Singers and Women’s Chorus will present a joint concert on Tuesday, Oct. 8, at 7:30 p.m. in Ouachita’s McBeth Recital Hall in Mabee Fine Arts Center.

September 24, 2019 - Gracie Stover

Ouachita Baptist University’s Division of Music will present a joint program featuring the Ouachita Singers and Women’s Chorus on Tuesday, Oct. 8, at 7:30 p.m. The concert, to be held in McBeth Recital Hall in Mabee Fine Arts Center, is free and open to the public.

“The program has been selected to be diverse, educational, entertaining and enjoyable for the students and, of course, for the audience,” said Dr. Natilan Crutcher, visiting assistant professor of music and director of the Women’s Chorus. “It is a mixture of selections ranging from spiritual arrangements by Mark Hayes to an a capella piece by George and Ira Gershwin.”

The concert will begin with the Women’s Chorus performing Craig Hella Johnson’s arrangement of “Will There Really Be a ‘Morning?’” and René Clausen’s “Barter.” They also will perform Mark Hayes’ arrangement of “Wade in the Water,” as well as George and Ira Gershwin’s “Embraceable You,” arranged by Kirby Shaw. The Women’s Chorus will conclude its portion of the concert with Brian Lewis’ “Benedictus” and the traditional spiritual piece “Dry Bones” arranged by Mark Hayes.

Next, the Ouachita Singers will perform “No Hidin’ Place” arranged by Moses Hogan and “The Mighty Power of God” arranged by Mark Hayes. The Ouachita Singers will then continue with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s “Veni Sancte Spiritus K. 47,” “It Is Well with My Soul” arranged by Craig Courtney and Elaine Hagenberg’s “O Love.” They will then perform Eleanor Daley’s “My Master from a Garden Rose” and “Heavenly Home” arranged by Shawn Kirchner.

Dr. Crutcher and Joshua Brown, instructor of music and director of choral activities at Ouachita, are both new conductors to the university’s singing groups.

“We have some hymn settings that people might know and enjoy, but I think the greatest reason to come to the concert is our students,” said Brown, director of the Ouachita Singers. “In my short time here, I have seen how talented and passionate they are, and their performance will show all they have accomplished this far into the semester. I know that whoever comes will be moved by what they hear.”

For Ouachita Singers member Emma Pitts, a senior choral music education major from Clarksville, Ark., the community she has found in the Division of Music and the Ouachita Singers “is really what makes me love my major.”

“We become like family for one another, and we get to create beautiful music together which binds us in a really special way that can be life changing for many of us,” Pitts said.

The Women’s Chorus will be accompanied on piano by Kristen LaMadrid, Ouachita staff accompanist, and the Ouachita Singers will be accompanied by Dr. Mary Chung, assistant professor of music at Ouachita.

For more information, contact Joshua Brown at [email protected] or 870-245-5143.