North Carolina Symphony and North Carolina Master Chorale Announce Chorale to Serve as Symphony’s Resident Chorus

RALEIGH (February 12, 2015) -- The North Carolina Symphony and the North Carolina Master Chorale announced today that the Chorale will serve as the Symphony’s Resident Chorus.  The Symphony’s Music Director is Grant Llewellyn and the Master Chorale’s Music Director is Alfred E. Sturgis.

“The North Carolina Symphony and the North Carolina Master Chorale have both long been a part of North Carolina’s cultural life, and we have partnered together often.” Llewellyn said.  “We look forward to working together in the years to come to continue to bring great music to our audiences.”

"We feel that our relationship with the Symphony provides us with additional opportunities to explore and present the great choral orchestral repertoire, and to continue to attract the best singers in our area who also seek this opportunity," Sturgis said.

Founded in 1932, the North Carolina Symphony gives more than 200 performances annually to adults and school children in more than 50 North Carolina counties. An entity of the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources, the orchestra employs 66 professional musicians, under the artistic leadership of Music Director and Conductor Grant Llewellyn, Resident Conductor William Henry Curry, and Associate Conductor David Glover.

Based in downtown Raleigh’s spectacular Meymandi Concert Hall at the Duke Energy Centerfor the Performing Arts and an outdoor summer venue at Booth Amphitheatre in Cary, N.C., the Symphony performs about 60 concerts annually in the Raleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill and Cary metropolitan area. It holds regular concert series in Fayetteville, New Bern, Southern Pines and Wilmington—as well as individual concerts in many other North Carolina communities throughout the year—and conducts one of the most extensive education programs of any U.S. orchestra.

One of the major choral organizations of the Southeast, the North Carolina Master Chorale has been performing choral-orchestral masterworks for more than 70 years.  Under the direction of Alfred E. Sturgis since 1993, the Master Chorale presents a diverse repertoire from the Renaissance to Contemporary. Its singers, selected by audition, bring a collective wealth of training and experience. The Master Chorale regularly collaborates with symphony orchestras, opera companies, ballet and touring productions. Founded as the Raleigh Oratorio Society in 1942, Master Chorale has evolved into a major regional performing arts group that works with over 250 artist-musicians each season, reaching an annual audience of over 10,000 choral arts enthusiasts.

CONTACT: Joe Newberry, 919.789.5484, [email protected]