Warner Classics & Jazz

Biography

Praised by the New York Times for its “precise, pure, and deeply felt singing”, and by the Los Angeles Times for its “luxurious perfection”, in 2003/04 the GRAMMY® Award-winning vocal ensemble Chanticleer performs concerts across the United States, embarks on tours to Asia and Europe, and releases its 27th CD.

Chanticleer has developed a remarkable reputation for its vivid interpretations of vocal literature, from Renaissance to jazz, and from gospel to venturesome new music. With its seamless blend of twelve male voices, ranging from countertenor to bass, the ensemble has earned international renown as “an orchestra of voices”.

Chanticleer’s 26th season encompasses concerts in 23 states and Canada. The group tours to Taiwan and Japan in Fall 2003, and travels to Europe in Spring 2004. The ensemble’s 27th CD, Evening Prayer: Purcell Anthems and Sacred Songs, debuts in stores in October 2003. In addition to touring and recording, Chanticleer performs a 23-concert Bay Area subscription season. Since 1986 Chanticleer’s education outreach program, Singing in the Schools, has brought the beauty, joy and discipline of choral singing to thousands of students in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond.

Highlights of Chanticleer’s 2002/2003 season included four themed concert programs showcasing the ensemble’s trademark versatility in early, classical, holiday, and contemporary music; approximately 100 concerts including tours to 23 states as well as two European tours; and the release in November 2002 of a new Teldec CD, Our American Journey, which spans four centuries of music in North America from the Mexican Baroque to American classics and includes world premiere commissions written expressly for Chanticleer. The season closed on June 15 with 25 and Counting! a free concert dedicated to the people of San Francisco in celebration of Chanticleer’s 25th anniversary. A compilation CD, Chanticleer: A Portrait debuted in March 2003.

In August 2002 Hinshaw Music, an international choral music publisher, issued the Chanticleer Silver Jubilee Anthology of Choral Music in recognition of Chanticleer’s invaluable contribution to the art of choral singing.

Since 1994, Chanticleer has been recording exclusively for Teldec Classics International, making the group’s recordings available worldwide. The ensemble’s catalogue of two dozen recordings includes Colors of Love, which won the GRAMMY® Award for Best Small Ensemble Performance (with or without Conductor) and the Contemporary A Cappella Recording Award for Best Classical Album. The ensemble’s 2000 release, Magnificat, a disc of early music devoted to the Virgin Mary, climbed to the top 5 on Billboard’s Classical Chart. In October 2001, Teldec released a new Christmas recording with Chanticleer, featuring guest artist soprano Dawn Upshaw, which also reached the top five on the Billboard Classical Chart. Close on its heels the world-premiere recording of Tavener’s Lamentations and Praises was released in January 2002 to high praise, and garnered two 2003 GRAMMY®
Awards, for Best Classical Small Ensemble Performance (with or without Conductor) and for Best Classical Contemporary Composition.

Named for the “clear-singing” rooster in Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales, Chanticleer was founded in 1978 by tenor Louis Botto, who sang with the group until 1989 and served as Artistic Director until his death in 1997. In 1999, Christine Bullin joined Chanticleer as President & General Director, leading both the artistic and administrative sides of the organisation. Music Director Joseph Jennings joined the ensemble as a countertenor in 1983, and shortly thereafter assumed his current title. A prolific composer and arranger, Mr. Jennings has provided the group with some of its most popular repertoire, most notably spirituals, gospel music, and jazz standards.

Chanticleer’s long-standing commitment to developing the choral repertoire has led the group to commission works from an ever-growing list of important composers. The 2002/03 season saw premieres by Brent Michael Davids, Jackson Hill, Jaakko Mäntyjärvi, and Steven Stucky. Past commissions include works by Mark Adamo, Chen Yi, David Conte, Brent Michael Davids, Anthony Davis, Guido López-Gavilán, William Hawley, Jake Heggie, Tania León, John Musto, Bernard Rands, Steven Sametz, Carlos Sanchez-Guttierez, Paul Schoenfield, Steven Stucky, Sir John Tavener, and Augusta Read Thomas.

Chanticleer is the recipient of major grants from The National Endowment for the Arts, the California Arts Council, The James Irvine Foundation, The William & Flora Hewlett Foundation, The William Randolph Hearst Foundation, and the City of San Francisco. With the help of foundation and corporate support, the group brings the gift of singing to young people by conducting artist-in-the-schools residencies both on tour and in the San Francisco Bay Area. Chanticleer’s activities as a not-for-profit corporation are supported by its administrative staff and Board of Trustees.




Here’s what critics have to say about Chanticleer…

“The singing of Chanticleer is breathtaking in its accuracy of intonation, purity of blend, variety of colour, and swagger of style” (The Boston Globe).

“I can’t think of another ‘orchestra of voices’ that can shuttle with such proficiency from Renaissance polyphony to gospel, contemporary classical to jazz” (The Chicago Tribune).

“Chanticleer fascinates and enthrals for much the same reason a fine chocolate or a Rolls Royce does: through luxurious perfection” (Los Angeles Times).