The Oregon Repertory Singers (ORS) is a mixed vocal ensemble in

Portland Portland most commonly refers to: * Portland, Oregon, the largest city in the state of Oregon, in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States * Portland, Maine, the largest city in the state of Maine, in the New England region of the northeas ...

Oregon Oregon () is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. The Columbia River delineates much of Oregon's northern boundary with Washington (state), Washington, while the Snake River delineates much of it ...

, founded in 1974. The choir performs a wide range of works from all time periods and languages, although over the years a special emphasis has been placed on contemporary music of the Americas.

Recordings

Since 1980, ORS has commissioned and/or debuted 20 new works by American artists. In October 1988, ORS completed a four compact disc contract with

Koch International Classics Entertainment One Ltd., trading as eOne, is an American-owned Canadian multinational entertainment company. Based in Toronto, Ontario, the company is primarily involved in the acquisition, distribution, and production of films and television s ...

to record new American music. These recordings include * ''

Berliner Messe ''Berliner Messe'' (or ''Berlin Mass'') is a mass setting by Estonian composer Arvo Pärt. Commissioned for the 90th Katholikentag in Berlin in 1990,

'' by

Arvo Pärt Arvo Pärt (; born 11 September 1935) is an Estonian composer of contemporary classical music. Since the late 1970s, Pärt has worked in a minimalist style that employs tintinnabuli, a compositional technique he invented. Pärt's music is in pa ...

and ''Mass to St. Anthony'' by

Lou Harrison Lou Silver Harrison (May 14, 1917 – February 2, 2003) was an American composer, music critic, music theorist, painter, and creator of unique musical instruments. Harrison initially wrote in a dissonant, ultramodernist style similar to his form ...

* ''Missa Gaia'' by

Libby Larsen Elizabeth Brown Larsen (born December 24, 1950) is a contemporary American classical composer. Along with composer Stephen Paulus, she is a co-founder of the Minnesota Composers Forum, now the American Composers Forum. A former holder of the Pa ...

and ''Echoes Between the Silent Peaks'' by

Stephen Paulus Stephen Paulus (August 24, 1949 – October 19, 2014) was an American Grammy Award winning composer, best known for his operas and choral music. His style is essentially tonal, and melodic and romantic by nature. His best-known piece is his 1 ...

* A collection of holiday music called ''The Glory of Christmas'' * ''

Fern Hill "Fern Hill" (1945) is a poem by the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, first published in ''Horizon'' magazine in October 1945, with its first book publication in 1946 as the last poem in '' Deaths and Entrances''. Thomas had started writing ''Fern Hill'' ...

'' by

John Corigliano John Paul Corigliano Jr. (born February 16, 1938) is an American composer of contemporary classical music. His scores, now numbering over one hundred, have won him the Pulitzer Prize, five Grammy Awards, Grawemeyer Award for Music Composition, an ...

Other ORS recordings include a compact disc of '' Rachmaninoff's Vespers'' with members of the Moscow State Chamber Choir under Vladimir Minin. In 1995 ORS was included, along with Chanticleer and

The King's Singers The King's Singers are a British a cappella vocal ensemble founded in 1968. They are named after King's College in Cambridge, England, where the group was formed by six choral scholars. In the United Kingdom, their popularity peaked in the 19 ...

, in a compact disc ''Christmas Around the Country'', which was distributed nationally by

National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other n ...

. An excerpt from the 1995 Glory of Christmas concert broadcast on NPR's

Performance Today ''Performance Today'' is a Peabody Award-winning classical music radio program, first aired in 1987 and hosted since 2000 by Fred Child. It is the most listened-to daily classical music radio program in the United States, with 1.2 million liste ...

was so well-received that two hour-long specials on ORS followed. In 2018 ORS released "Shadows on the Stars" with Gothic Records, an album featuring the music of Pacific Northwest composers, including among others

Morten Lauridsen Morten Johannes Lauridsen (born February 27, 1943) is an American composer. A National Medal of Arts recipient (2007), he was composer-in-residence of the Los Angeles Master Chorale from 1994 to 2001, and is the Distinguished Professor Emeritus ...

. The album earned the group the America Prize in Choral Performance for the community chorus division.

Directors

In April 2011, it was announced that following the retirement of thirty-five year veteran artistic director Gil Seeley, the ensemble is headed by Ethan Sperry, Director of Choral Activities at

Portland State University Portland State University (PSU) is a public research university in Portland, Oregon. It was founded in 1946 as a post-secondary educational institution for World War II veterans. It evolved into a four-year college over the following two decades ...

References

External links

Oregon Repertory Singers homepage
Choirs in Oregon Musical groups from Portland, Oregon Music of Portland, Oregon Musical groups established in 1974 1974 establishments in Oregon {{US-singing-group-stub