New York Choral Society Celebrates 51st Anniversary With Winter Gala at National Arts Club

The New York Choral Society will celebrate its 51st Anniversary with a Winter Gala on March 11, 2010 at The National Arts Club.

The esteemed chorus and its Music Director John Daly Goodwin will be joined by friends and patrons in a festive evening honoring three of the most revered artists in the performing arts industry: Eve Queler, the Music Director of the Opera Orchestra of New York, will be presented with the Music Leadership Award; Composer Stephen Paulus will receive the Choral Excellence Award; and Haruko Smith, Founder and Chairman of the September Concert Foundation, will be given the Humanitarian Award.

Gala festivities will begin at 6:00 PM with a cocktail reception followed by a 7:00 dinner and awards presentation. The awards will be presented to the honorees by Italian soprano Renata Scotto, famed ballet dancer Jaques d'Amboise, and American composer Mary Rodgers, daughter of the legendary songwriter Richard Rodgers. Afterwards, guests are invited to enjoy a dessert reception with entertainment provided by soprano Angela Meade and other great luminaries of the vocal arts world. The evening also features a silent auction of items generously donated by friends and patrons of the Choral Society.

HONOREES

Eve Queler
Eve Queler has conducted over 100 operas in concert at Carnegie Hall with The Opera Orchestra of New York. Standing out among her many successes are Wagner's Rienzi and Tristan und Isolde, Berlioz's Benvenuto Cellini, Smetana's Dalibor, and Richard Strauss's Die Liebe der Danae. She received one of the highest awards presented by the French government when she was named a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French Minister of Culture for her commitment to French operas and also received the Sanford Medal, Yale University's highest musical honor. She has championed many neglected Russian and Czech operas that are staples in Central Europe but virtually unknown in America. She was the first conductor in the U.S. to perform Mussorgsky's unfinished Khovanshchina with orchestration by Shostakovich, as well as the first Czech-language performance of Janacek's Katya Kabanova (1979), Jen?fa (1988), and Dvo?ák's Rusalka (1987). Known for her ability to spot new talent, Eve Queler has provided critical early exposure to such opera luminaries such as José Carreras, Renée Fleming, Dmitri Hvorostovsky, James Morris, Aprile Millo, Lauren Flanigan, Stephanie Blythe, and Deborah Voigt.

Stephen Paulus
Composer Stephen Paulus has been hailed as "...a bright, fluent inventor with a ready lyric gift." (The New Yorker) His prolific output of more than two hundred works is represented in many genres, including music for orchestra, chorus, chamber ensembles, solo voice, keyboard and opera. Commissions have been received from the New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, and the Boston Lyric Opera, in addition to many others from some of the world's greatest chamber music ensembles and solo artists. He has served as Composer in Residence for the orchestras of Atlanta, Minnesota, Tucson and Annapolis, and his works have been championed by such eminent conductors as Sir Neville Marriner, Kurt Masur, Christoph von Dohanyi, Leonard Slatkin, Yoel Levi, the late Robert Shaw, and numerous others. His choral works have been performed and recorded by some of the most distinguished choruses in the United States, including the New York Concert Singers, Dale Warland Singers, Los Angeles Master Chorale, Robert Shaw Festival Singers, New Music Group of Philadelphia and Master Chorale of Washington DC among others. A recipient of both Guggenheim and NEA Fellowships, Paulus is also co-founder and a current Board Vice President of the highly esteemed American Composers Forum, the largest composer service organization in the world.

Haruko Smith
Haruko Smith is the Founder and Chairman of The September Concert, a series of free performances organized by individuals, schools, businesses, and associations to bring communities together. In addition to The September Concert, Smith is a full-time COO of Felissimo Universal Corporation of America. She directs DESIGN 21: Social Design Network, a joint venture with UNESCO, which promotes Design for the Greater Good and its companion website, Social Designer. Under her leadership, Felissimo's landmark townhouse has also long been a home to many creative ideas, products and exhibitions, as well as a venue for socially and culturally significant events. Smith also serves as Director of the UNESCO/Tribute 21 Fund, overseeing the launch of DREAM (Dance, Read, Express Art, Music) Centers for children in post-conflict regions of the world. Since 2002, DREAM Center has opened in Kabul (Afghanistan), Port-au-Prince (Haiti), Phnom Penh (Cambodia), Monrovia (Liberia) and East Jerusalem. In 2005 she was a New Yorker of the Week on NY1, and a nominee for NY Public Library's Brooke Astor Award. She received Community Service Award from the Asian American Foundation in 2007, and Culture Machine Award in 2009.

ABOUT NEW YORK CHORAL SOCIETY
The New York Choral Society (NYCS), founded in 1958, has become known by audiences and critics for the quality of its performances and the diversity of its repertoire, which encompasses well-known choral masterworks as well as many compositions rarely heard in concert halls. The NYCS has presented eleven world premieres and has commissioned works by Paul Alan Levi, Morton Gould, Stephen Paulus, and Robert De Cormier.

John Daly Goodwin, Music Director of the New York Choral Society, has built on the ensemble's tradition of excellence over the past 22 seasons to make it the chorus of choice for American Ballet Theatre, the Richard Tucker Music Foundation, the September Concert Foundation, and the Shanghai Symphony Broadcasting Orchestra. Under his direction, the chorus has performed in China, the Czech Republic, Israel, Austria, France, Italy, and Greece. His performances of such works as Mahler's 8th Symphony, Beethoven's Missa solemnis, and the Requiems of Verdi, Mozart, and Brahms have achieved much critical acclaim. He has conducted more than 90 concerts around New York City, including 40 in Carnegie Hall and 7 at Lincoln Center, and has prepared choruses for Leonard Bernstein, Dennis Russell Davies, Asher Fisch, Yong Yan Hu, Yehudi Menuhin, Eve Queler, Julius Rudel, Gerard Schwarz, Leonard Slatkin, and Robert Spano and for 17 telecasts.
Goodwin serves on the music faculty at New York University, where he teaches and conducts the Choral Arts Society. His strong personal commitment to music education has led him to do extensive volunteer work with aspiring young musicians. Through Young Audiences, Artsgenesis, and the New York Choral Society's Mini Maestros program, he has brought the gift of music to thousands of children in New York City public schools.

TICKETS: Individual tickets are $250 and $500 for the full gala evening, or $75 for an 8:00 entry to Dessert & Entertainment only. Tables of ten can be purchased for $2,500 and $5,000. Tickets are available online at http://www.nychoral.org/support/gala.php. For more information call (212) 247-3878

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