NASA Astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson To Join Houston Chamber Choir's THIS SKY Concert

The Grammy Award-winning Houston Chamber Choir has announced that NASA Astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson will be the special guest for its upcoming concert offering, This Sky, at St. Philip Presbyterian Church on Saturday, Nov. 16 at 7:30 p.m. Conducted by the Houston Chamber Choir's Artistic Director Designate Dr. Betsy Cook Weber, Caldwell Dyson will join the Choir for an interview segment, as well as helping to close out the concert with a special surprise collaboration.

Caldwell Dyson was selected as a NASA astronaut in 1998 and, most recently, launched to the International Space Station on March 23, 2024, as a flight engineer on the Soyuz MS-25 spacecraft. She spent six months aboard the station as an Expedition 71 flight engineer, conducting science experiments and maintaining the space station.

“We are thrilled to have Tracy join us for this concert where the sky and outer space play starring roles,” says Weber. “Houston Chamber Choir loves to collaborate with artistic and community partners to expand our reach and amplify the stories behind our work. It's such an honor to work with NASA and bring Tracy's perspective as an astronaut to this work that you might call ‘out of this world.'”

Humans have always looked to the sky for answers to the big “Why?” And composers have done the same. The Houston Chamber Choir offers a stellar compilation of pieces that ponder the heavens. The centerpiece of this program, in addition to music by Heinrich Schütz, Venezuelan-Texan Carlos Cordero, Johannes Brahms, and others, is the breathtaking “Consolation of Apollo.”

Written in 2014 by American composer Kile Smith, “Consolation” has important connections to Houston, with texts pulled from the philosopher, Boethius, as well as from the astronaut crew of Apollo 8. Accompanied by breathtaking projections of images from and about space, this concert is sure to engage the imagination aurally and visually.

The Houston Chamber Choir is composed of 24 professional musicians of diverse backgrounds who hail from some of the finest music programs in the country, including Cleveland Institute of Music, New England Conservatory in Boston, Moores School of Music at the University of Houston, College Conservatory of Music, University of Cincinnati and the UCLA Herb Alpert School of Music. Members of the Choir have performed professionally across the United States and internationally, singing in festivals, operas, concerts, church choirs and in musical theater.

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