Annual choral performance probes the nation’s identity with bluegrass and a call for tolerance

NORFOLK — Any great weekend in Norfolk ends with music, and such was the case on Sunday evening, Aug. 2, when the Litchfield County Choral Union (LCCU) took over the historic digs of the Music Shed for a novel performance that traced the United States’ complicated lineage through the lenses of patriotic anthem, Americana and global music traditions, all carried by the soaring voice of a 69-strong choir.

As a capstone event for the town’s summer festival, called Weekend in Norfolk, the time-honored singing group, composed of choral singers from across the region, held its annual concert inside the redwood and cedar lined hall of the building. The iconic structure was built in 1906 with the direct purpose of housing the choir, which itself was founded seven years prior. Although the Music Shed’s usage has diversified since then, notably as the primary venue for the Yale School of Music’s Norfolk Chamber Music Festival, the LCCU still hosts its summer performance at its historic home.

Titled “From Roots to Promise: Singing America at 250,” this year’s program was designed as a nod to the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence. In his introduction included in the concert pamphlet, LCCU Music Director Gabriel Löfvall, an accomplished conductor in his second season with the group, asks, “At 250, who are we as a country? Are we fulfilling the ideals upon which our democracy was founded?”

Löfvall said his curation of the evening’s program was meant to use diverse musical traditions to explore those questions.

Sunday’s performance notably featured accompaniment by a full bluegrass band, complete with fiddle, banjo, mandolin, guitar, upright bass, percussion, fife and piano.

Speaking amid an excited buzz during an after-show reception outside the venue, Löfvall said that “The World Beloved: A Bluegrass Mass,” one of the show’s two centerpieces, is the only work he’s aware of that combines choral music with Appalachian folk traditions.

The piece was composed about two decades ago by Carol Barnett with the libretto — or lyrics — written by Marisha Chamberlain. Löfvall said he enjoyed developing the 30-minute piece with the choir and the bluegrass band, given that it represents an unlikely combination of ideas coming together to produce something new and unique, which he said is representative of the strengths of this country.

“The instruments [Barnett] uses are bluegrass, but the idiom is very complex,” he said, with the term idiom referring to the choral writing. Despite the stereotype that choral music doesn’t necessarily call for barn dances, when it comes to this piece, “it makes you tap your foot,” Löfvall said.

The other centerpiece was Cecilia McDowall’s 2018 “Everyday Wonders: The Girl from Aleppo,” with text by Kevin Crossley, which traces the true story of a Kurdish teenager with cerebral palsy named Nujeen Mustafa when war forced her to flee from her homeland to Europe.

Löfvall, himself an immigrant from Argentina, said that the piece represents to him a vision of the future potential of the United States, and an affirmation of its history as a place where people from around the world interact and exchange ideas.

“I’m always fascinated by the American experiment,” he said, and when it works, “it’s thanks to tolerance and everyone bringing in their best.”

The rest of the performance was bookended with an opening of “Sweet is the Work,” written by Norfolk composer Robbins Battell who died in 1895. The group performs the piece each year in honor of the composer, who inspired the founding of the LCCU.

It was followed by William Billings’ Revolution Era patriotic song “Chester”—“It represents to me the birth of America,” Löfvall said.

The program was capped with a performance of Paul Halley’s “Freedom Trilogy,” composed in 1994, which blends Gregorian prayer song, South African chant and the famed hymn “Amazing Grace.”

The performance closed to an extended standing ovation before the audience slowly filtered out to a reception with refreshments waiting outside just below the Music Shed’s broad facade.

As he fielded congratulations from all angles, LCCU President Felix Graham-Jones said, “That’s what we do for fun in the summer, isn’t it!”