Event

Yale Russian Chorus Concert

The Yale Russian Chorus (YRC) attracts students and members of the greater Yale community from a variety of backgrounds and representing numerous interests, all united in their love and appreciation for Slavic choral music and culture. The YRC was founded in 1953 by Denis Mickiewicz and George Litton as an extension of Yale's Russian language club, and has thrived since then throughout numerous generations of Yale students, having served as a powerful force toward the preservation of Russian choral music during the Cold War era. It is now recognized as one of the world's most important performance ensembles of Slavic music. The YRC's repertoire, which spans from the twelfth century to the twenty-first, includes a variety of sacred and secular music, including ancient chant, cultural songs, and major choral works by Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakoff, and Rachmaninoff, to name a few.

Mark Bailey was appointed YRC artistic director in 1995. Since that time, the ensemble has performed in over fifty major American cities in a variety of major concert venues, including twice by invitation at Carnegie Hall. Other prominent performances during the last few seasons have included two gala appearances at Carnegie Hall, the White House for President Clinton, the St. Petersburg Festival at New York's Winter Garden, and the opening of the Hermitage exhibit at the Yale Center for British Art.

In 1996, the YRC released Chants and Carols, a recording that was praised by InTune magazine, proclaimed as a "must have" on NPR's "Performance Today," listed among the best recordings of the year by Billboard Magazine and the Richmond Times and placed on the 1996 New York Times critic's choice list. The Yale Russian Chorus continues to attract the attention and elicit the praise of the professional arts media.

Artistic Director, Mark Bailey:

Mark Bailey is extensively involved in the performance of baroque, classical, and early romantic instrumental, vocal/choral, and operatic works, with particular expertise in Slavic music of the 17th and 18th centuries, as well as the Bach family, Handel, Haydn, and Mozart. Currently Mr. Bailey is artistic director of the American Baroque Orchestra, which he founded, as well as the Yale Russian Chorus (YRC). Mr. Bailey frequently guest conducts renowned ensembles, such as Cappella Romana and Pro Coro Canada, particularly in the Slavic repertoire, as well as the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra for a performance of Messiah coming up in December 2013, and the Portland Baroque Orchestra, in collaboration with Cappella Romana, in 2014. As well, he often is invited to give presentations on Slavic baroque music, as he has at the Tafelmusik Baroque Summer Institute. Mr. Bailey has been a principal guest speaker on Slavic choral music for the Great Performers series and the Mostly Mozart festival at Lincoln Center in New York City. Other guest appearances include conducting two gala concerts at Carnegie Hall, featuring the music of Moscow and St. Petersburg.
His first recording with the YRC in 1996 was placed on The New York Times critics' choice list and described as a must-have recording by National Public Radio's Performance Today. Mr. Bailey's latest recording of Slavic music, entitled Immersion, is available on iTunes and Amazon.com. Due for release in 2013 is a recording of Slavic 17th and 18th century works with Mr. Bailey leading Pro Coro Canada. Among many fine reviews of Mr. Bailey's concerts,Northwest Reverb wrote of his collaboration with Cappella Romana: "the choir followed Bailey's detailed, expressive direction with rapt focusthey sounded like one solitary living creature, the expansion and contraction of the music coming as naturally as breath."

Former conducting positions include artistic/music director of the New Haven Oratorio Choir and Orchestra, the Westchester Concert Singers, The New England Benefit Orchestra, The Festival Chamber Orchestra at Yale, and assistant conductor of the Eastman Philharmonia, the opera department at the Eastman School of Music, and for the Heidelberg Castle Opera Festival, Heidelberg, Germany.
In addition to conducting, Mr. Bailey has been a baroque violist with the Arcadia Players, Northampton, Massachusetts, The Sebastian Players in Connecticut, and Schola Cantorum at Yale University. Mr. Bailey's instrumental and choral compositions and arrangements have been performed by ensembles such as Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra, which commissioned several works from Mr. Bailey for their 2011-2012 season opener, and other works of his have premiered at Lincoln Center, Yale University, Boston's landmark Emmanuel Church, and throughout the United States, as well as at St. Basil's Cathedral in Moscow, Russia. Approximately forty of his compositions have been published. In 2007 he received a commission from Yale instructor Scott Hartman and the Yale Trombones to compose a piece for them, which premiered in Hartford, Connecticut, in May 2008. Mr. Bailey is also co-founder and co-director of the Benchmark Performance Series on Cape Cod, and creator of the Slavic Music Festival at Yale University.
From 1992 to 2008, Mr. Bailey served on the faculty of St. Vladimir's Orthodox Seminary in Crestwood, New York, where he taught composition, analysis, choral leadership, and Church Slavonic. He also served on the conducting staff for the chapel choirs, founding and leading the Composers Seminar at St. Vladimir's in 2007 and 2008. Mr. Bailey is a Fellow at Davenport College, Yale University. In the field of research, he has curatorial responsibility for Yale's renowned collection of Historical Sound Recordings. Mr. Bailey earned his music degrees at the Eastman School of Music and at the Yale School of Music (through the Yale Institute of Sacred Music), Yale University. He has studied conducting principally with Harold Farberman, David Effron, and Marguerite Brooks, and has coached with Daniel Lewis among others. Outside of music, Mr. Bailey is extensively involved in animal welfare and, in 2012, was appointed by the mayor of the City of New Haven, Connecticut, as a humane commissioner.

Location

First Presbyterian Church (View)
2020 Fifth Street
Livermore, CA 94550
United States

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Contact

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Attendees

Jacki S.

Pleasanton, CA United States

Mar 07, 2015 11:39 AM

Wayne S.

Pleasanton, CA United States

Mar 07, 2015 11:39 AM

Pam H.

Hundal Foods

Livermore, CA United States

Mar 07, 2015 9:44 AM

Robert A.

Livermore, CA United States

Mar 07, 2015 9:44 AM

Nancy A.

Livermore, CA United States

Mar 07, 2015 9:44 AM

Name Withheld