Internationally
renowned composer, conductor and teacher Alice
Parker was born in Boston, MA in 1925. She began
composing as a young child, and wrote her first orchestral
score while still in high school. She graduated from
Smith College with a major in music performance and composition,
and then received her master's degree from the Juilliard
School where she studied choral conducting with Robert
Shaw. As Shaw began to organize the Robert Shaw Chorale,
he enlisted the young Parker to do research and create
choral arrangements for the new touring and recording
ensemble. The many Parker/Shaw settings of American folksongs,
hymns and spirituals from that period form an enduring
repertoire for choruses all around the world.
Ms.
Parker continued to work on her own compositions and
arrangements and has composed in all the choral forms
from opera to cantata, from sacred anthems to songs on
texts by distinguished poets. She has been commissioned
by such well-known groups as Chanticleer, the Vancouver
Chamber Singers, and the Atlanta Symphony,
as well as hundreds of community, school and church choruses.
Her works appear in the catalogs of a dozen publishing
companies.
In
1985, singers and choral directors who had been fired by
her talent and zeal, convinced her to start Melodious Accord,
Inc. an organization dedicated to presenting and recording
folk and contemporary music. The Musicians of Melodious Accord,
a 16-voice professional chamber chorus, has presented concerts,
made recordings, encouraged new composers, and inspired audiences
to explore their own impulse to sing. Their recordings include
the recently released CD O Sing the Glories, anthems
composed and arranged by Alice Parker, as well as Sweet
Manna, early American hymns; King and the Duke,
a tribute to Martin Luther King and Duke Ellington; Take
Me To The Water, spirituals, and Transformations, American
hymns and folk songs. Recently Melodious Accord, Inc., and
The Musicians of Melodious Accord, have embarked on The Alice
Parker Recording Project, a major recording program to document
and preserve Ms. Parker's original compositions. Generous
grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Aaron
Copland Music Fund, and the New York State Council on the
Arts, along with the contributions of many individual donors
have supported the project. This series of recordings of
sacred and secular music includes My Love and I, and, Listen,
Lord. Angels and Challengers: American Women Poets in Song, which
will present Parker settings of the poetry of Emily Dickinson,
Edna St. Vincent Millay, May Sarton and Elinor Wylie, and The
Family Reunion, one of four Parker folk operas, are
currently in progress.
Alice Parker continues to win converts to the cause of choral music. Through
the Melodious Accord Fellowship Program, mid-career professional musicians
are brought together for inspiration and refreshment in their teaching, composing
and conducting under her mentorship. Her techniques have encouraged a generation
of music teachers and choral conductors to think about music and the act of
conducting in new ways. No less an authority than Robert Shaw himself has said
of Parker that "she possesses a rare and creative musical intelligence."
Now a resident of western Massachusetts, Ms. Parker has published books on
melodic styles, choral improvisation and "Good Singing in Church".
Five videos have been released showing her work with hymns and folksongs. Ms.
Parker serves on the Board of Chorus America, and was honored by them, the
American Guild of Organists, and the Hymn Society in her seventy-fifth year.
She has also been recognized through the establishment of the Alice Parker-ASCAP-Chorus
America Award, which honors members of Chorus America who enlarge the choral
repertoire by moving in new directions. Most recently her contributions to
the regional, as well as the national choral music scene, were acknowledged
with the Nathan Gottschalk Memorial Award from the Pioneer Valley Symphony & Chorus
and a Lifetime Achievement award from Choral Arts of New England. Ms. Parker
is the recipient of four honorary doctorates and the Smith College medal. Her
enthusiasm for her work continues unabated, as she fills commissions for original
choral works, conducts performances and workshops, and creates circles of music
making wherever she goes.
Choral
music by Alice Parker
