A special performance takes place at 3:00 p.m. on Sunday, May 1 in Mead Chapel when the College-Community Chorus, Chamber Singers and College Orchestra join forces to present 20th century composer Ernest Bloch's Sacred Service.This free concert culminates a year-long celebration of Hillel's 50th anniversary on the Middlebury campus.
The work, premiered in 1934, draws from scripture, readings, and prayers of the morning and evening services of the Union Prayer Book for Jewish Worship. Composer-conductor-writer Alexander Knapp describes the work as a landmark in the evolution of Jewish music: its style is "akin, in many solo and orchestral passages, to the passionate nature and 'oriental' character to Bloch's earlier 'Jewish Cycle' [of instrumental works], as exemplified by the wide dynamic and emotional range, melismatic figures and reiterated notes, exotic scales and modes… and harmonic patterns, ritual flourishes…, syncopations…, and frequent changes of metre, [with] nonetheless a clear Western conception in the simplicity and directness of much of the choral writing." Rabbi Bob Freedman, from the Israel Congregation in Manchester Center, Vermont, sings the Cantor parts, and Jeff Rehbach conducts the combined ensembles. The concert opens with several shorter works by Jewish composers, including pieces for organ played by George Matthew, Jr.; for chorus, conducted by Jeff Rehbach; and for orchestra, conducted by Troy Peters.