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St. Olaf Choir to perform home concert Feb. 18, concluding 19-city winter tour of Midwest

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February 7, 2001

NORTHFIELD, Minn. ? The St. Olaf Choir will wrap up a successful 8-state, 19-city winter tour with a "home" concert Sunday, Feb. 18, at St. Olaf College.

The concert, free and open to the public, will be at 7:30 p.m. in Boe Memorial Chapel. John Ferguson, Elliott and Klara Stockdal Johnson Chair of Organ and Church Music at St. Olaf, will accompany the Choir.

The internationally acclaimed, 75-voice St. Olaf Choir, conducted by Anton Armstrong, is performing 20 concerts in Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Texas. The tour started Jan. 27 and included an historic joint concert with the St. Olaf Orchestra in San Antonio, Texas ? the first joint tour performance for the two ensembles.

The Choir will perform works of Johann Sebastian Bach, Thomas Weelkes, Conrad Susa, Moses Hogan, György Orbán, Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck, and F. Melius Christiansen, who founded the St. Olaf Choir and introduced a cappella singing to American choral music.

The program includes "Jauchzet dem Herrn alle Welt" by J.S. Bach; two pieces by Ferguson, "A Song of Thanksgiving" and an arrangement of "Lord of the Dance"; "The Shepherds Sing: Three Mystical Carols" by Susa; "Prayer" by Kenneth Jennings; "When David Heard" by Weelkes; "Cantate Domino" by Sweelinck; an arrangement of "Here I Am, Lord" by Ovid Young; and an arrangement of "My Soul?s Been Anchored in the Lord" by Hogan.

The St. Olaf Choir has toured annually since 1912, when it was founded by F. Melius Christiansen. A 1920 tour to major music centers of the East Coast sowed the seeds of the ensemble?s national reputation, establishing its a cappella style of singing as a primary element in American choral music.

Anton Armstrong, Harry R. and Thora H. Tosdal professor of music at St. Olaf College, has been conductor of the St. Olaf Choir since 1990. A 1978 bachelor of music graduate of St. Olaf (where he was a member of the St. Olaf Choir), Armstrong later earned a master of music degree in choral music from the University of Illinois and a doctor of musical arts degree in choral conducting from Michigan State University. He began teaching and conducting at St. Olaf after 10 years with the faculty of Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Mich.

John Ferguson, tour organist, is professor of organ and church music at St. Olaf and is cantor to the college?s Evangelical Lutheran Church in America student congregation. Ferguson is renowned nationally for his work with hymnody and hymn festivals, and has led numerous national festivals for the ACDA and AGO.

St. Olaf College prepares students to become responsible citizens of the world, fostering development of mind, body and spirit. A four-year, coeducational liberal arts college of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA), St. Olaf has a student enrollment of 2,950 and a full-time faculty of approximately 250. It is one of Money Guide?s top 100 "elite values in college education today," and it leads the nation?s colleges in percentage of students who study abroad.

Contact Michael Cooper at 507-786-3315 or cooperm@stolaf.edu.