Arts and Entertainment

Achill Choral Society prepares for upcoming performance at the Alton Mill

May 16, 2024   ·   0 Comments

By Constance Scrafield

The Achill Choral Society (ACS) has been invited for the second year to be the musical entertainment at the Tapestry of Art show coming up at the Alton Mill Arts Centre, put on by Headwaters Arts. The weekend of May 25 is set for this tremendous celebration of the arts.

What thrills Cathy Whitcombe, Preside nt of ACS, is the inclusion of music in a predominately visual arts centre.

She told the Citizen in an interview this week, “Headwaters Arts is not just visual arts.. The premise was how artists are inspired by music; the call was to paint something expressed in music.”

What pleases Ms. Whitcombe particularly about the invitation is the response by the organizers to the way the choir performed and entertained audiences last year.

“They fund us to come,” she said. “Our professional director and accompanist come with us and Headwaters Arts is supporting them too.

“It is very nice for [artistic director and conductor] Shawn Grenke and [collaborative accompanist] Nancy Dettbarn to experience our community too.”

While not a concert as such, the choir will be performing at this event with an hour of singing a variety of music. Tapestry of Art gives them a chance to sing to people who don’t know of them yet, which is appreciated.

Ms. Whitcombe spoke about the choir, saying, “We’re a pretty strong democracy, with 68 members. We have just written our articles to maintain our not-for-profit status. We have had to teach ourselves to set our set of bylaws. We’re very lucky that we are a self-directed organization.” 

Their spring concert on April 28 was fantastic, Ms. Whitcombe assured us. In recent years, with the chill of Covid still in the air, it used to be they could not get people to come. This time it was a full house.

Quite recently, they were singing in Toronto, doing amazing music in Eglington at St. George Church and the United Church of St. George for a combined choir of 100 voices.

How essential music is to everything brought her comment about its almost miraculous benefit for seniors with such programs as Music for Memories. This involves bringing music that a senior person loves for them to listen and the experience is amazing.

Back to Tapestry of Art, Ms. Whitcombe had high praise for the tent-covered annex at the Alton Mill.

She told us that the annex has the best acoustics, and the roof “does wonderful things for sound.”

After their appearance at Headwaters Arts, the choir is off for the summer and will meet back on Sept. 11 for the first rehearsal, which is always on Wednesday nights at the Westminster United Church in Orangeville.

New people are welcome to have a go and “if they like us,” go through a “vocal location.” to potentially become members.

What follows is preparation for a winter program for the end of November. In order to rehearse at home in between Wednesdays, they put practice pages and YouTube recordings of the choir, as sing-along practice and to learn the music.

Amid his busy life, Shawn Grenke is working on his doctoral program in conducting through the University of Alberta.

“Shawn is a stickler for taking notes,” Ms. Whitcombe warned us. “You have to listen to the director. Since he has been working on his doctorate, we’ve seen a real depth to his conducting.” 

For more information, email info@achill.ca.

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