Articles

By John Y. Lawrence Musical tributes to the victims of the Holocaust are plentiful, but likeminded tributes to the musical culture that the Holocaust nearly destroyed are more rare. Such a tribute took place Sunday afternoon in Rockefeller Memorial Chapel. Co-organized by James Kallembach and Cantor David Berger as part of the University of Chicago’s Quire & Place series, the concert was titled “Voices of Kristallnacht,” marking the atrocities of November 9-10, 1938. The first half of the program was dedicated to Jewish sacred music from the 17th century to the present, with an emphasis on music of the late 19th and early 20th centuries—the sort of music that European Jews of the...

By Sam Cholke Shrine of Christ the King has raised $50,000 in less than month since a fire ravaged the church. Rev. Matthew Talarico, a canon at the shrine at 6401 S. Woodlawn Ave., said the congregation has found great support among its neighbors as the church works on rebuilding after the Oct. 7 fire. “This is not about a fire, this is about the community response, a response of solidarity,” Talarico said. He said Rockefeller Chapel was able to accommodate holding services at the last minute on Monday with only six hours notice after a pipe burst at St. Thomas the Apostle, where Shrine of Christ the King has held Mass since the fire. “That was really neat,” Talarico said of holding Mass...

Joey Brink leads an unsuspecting family visiting for Admissions Day up the 271-step tower It’s college visitation time, and I recently accompanied my daughter, Meg, and her friend, Savanna, to check out the University of Chicago. The information session was helpful, but the best part was hearing about the University’s quirky admission essay questions – e.g., “What's so odd about odd numbers?” and “So where is Waldo, really?” My favorite: “How do you feel about Wednesdays?” I could really launch on that one. Aside from being Mittwoch (auf Deutsch), “Wednesday” is basically an Old English mash-up of “Odin’s Day” – as in the Norse god Odin, a deity associated with war and magic and mayhem....

By M.L. Rantala Classical Music Critic The Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Carillon in Rockefeller Chapel at the University of Chicago is the world’s second largest musical instrument. The largest is its sister carillon (also named for Laura Spelman Rockefeller) at the Riverside Church in New York City. This year, the University of Chicago marks half a century of carillon festivals. The 50th annual festival, titled “The Bells of Summer,” runs through August 23. Every Sunday beginning at 5 pm, there is a free, one-hour performance open to the public. Most folks sit on the spacious lawn of Rockefeller Chapel, 5850 S. Woodlawn Ave., while some sit inside the chapel to enjoy the music and...

By Susie Allen Award-winning carillon performer and composer Joey Brink has been selected as the next University Carillonneur. His appointment begins in October. As part of this key ceremonial role, Brink will perform for all major University events and deliver daily recitals on the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Carillon at Rockefeller Chapel. In addition, Brink will introduce University students to the art of playing the instrument, offering tryouts to those who are interested and training a studio of ten toward proficiency as carillonneurs. “The Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Carillon is an integral part of Rockefeller Chapel and of the University as a whole. At occasions both...

By Susie Allen This summer, the Rockefeller Chapel carillon will ring out in celebration of the 50th anniversary of a beloved tradition: the annual carillon concert series Bells of Summer. Since 1965, visitors have come to Rockefeller Chapel with blankets and picnic baskets in hand to spend a summer afternoon listening to the music of the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial Carillon, the world’s second-heaviest musical instrument. The event features weekly performances from June to August by guest artists from around the world. “The sound of the carillon permeates our life at the University of Chicago,” said Elizabeth Davenport, dean of Rockefeller Chapel. “We hear it playing as we cross...

By John von Rhein Johann Sebastian Bach's music is ever with us and, indeed, was much in evidence over the weekend in Chicago, what with Bach Week Festival performances at North Park University and at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, all of them involving ensembles of modern instruments. But the relatively rare chance to hear Bach's Mass in B minor done with a chamber orchestra of period instruments and correspondingly reduced choral forces lured me to Rockefeller Memorial Chapel at the University of Chicago on Saturday night to catch this monument of Western sacred music as performed by the Rockefeller Chapel Choir and Orchestra under James Kallembach's direction. It turned out to be a...

By MJ Chen “Intimate” is an unlikely word to describe a space as large and austere as Rockefeller Chapel, and an even unlikelier one to extend to its historic, 8,565-pipe E.M. Skinner organ. Fortunately for us, the Brian Gerrish Organ Performance Series is committed to reclaiming the intimacy of the organ, demystifying the instrument and introducing its magic to a new generation. This past Saturday, it featured organist Nathan Laube in recital, and his masterful performance was easily the greatest musical experience this reviewer has enjoyed on campus thus far. It is tempting to describe the organ as a symphonic instrument: Its myriad of individual timbres can mix with ease to simulate a...

Blue Heron is engaged in a multiyear project performing and recording music from the “Henrican” partbooks at Peterhouse, Cambridge, and it is from these rather obscure scores that the evening’s selections were drawn. The 13-member choir, conducted by artistic director Scott Metcalfe, showed themselves a first-class ensemble. Their corporate sound is more robust than many early music groups yet refined and well blended. Blue Heron appears to be a true consortium of soloists and Metcalfe allowed the singers’ individual timbres to shine forth throughout the part writing. The main work was a mass by that most prolific of early composers, Anonymous. The “Missa sine nomine” (mass without a name)...

By Grace Hauck When I think of Rockefeller Chapel, I think Gothic. I think stone, gargoyles, arches, vaulting, wooden pews, red velvet seats, metal lanterns, and stained glass. I think strength, structure, and command. You can imagine my shock, then, when I walked into Rockefeller’s east transept bay (the small section of pews off to the right) to behold Libby Chaney’s newest fabric installation, Seasons—a profusion of color, textures, and patterns. Not Gothic, to say the least. This Cleveland-based fiber artist’s impressionistic compilation of chronological snapshots, broken up into four vertical panels, totals 450 square feet and covers all three walls of the east transept. Not only does...