Summer Choral Festival cancelled for 2013

Dear Friends of the Cappella Festiva Summer Choral Festival,

It is with much disappointment that we must announce the necessity for the cancellation Cappella Festiva's beloved summer choral festival at Vassar College for 2013. Much care and thought on the part of Christine Howlett, Susan Bialek and the entire Cappella Festiva Board of Directors went into making this rather painful decision.

The reason stems from plans for major, massive construction planned at Vassar for this summer between Skinner Hall and the Vassar Chapel. Although we were granted space of some kind on campus for our festival, possibly in another part of campus, in the end it turned out that our primary space would be the chapel, which is directly adjacent to the major construction area. The actual construction team could not say at this point whether the noise and/or residual construction dust and debris would or would not be with us for the duration of our stay. In addition, the college is unable to guarantee us an alternate space at all at this time. This week our final contract came and it provides the college the option to cancel up until the start date if the construction situation dictates, which we feel strongly would be the worst thing to pass along to our participants at the last minute.

All involved in this decision are of course very disappointed, but don't want to risk a horrible experience for the program and the singers once past the point of no return. We have investigated other locations, but found none comparable that would be available in July.

Going along with the adage that when one door closes, another opens, we are pleased to announce, on a much more positive note, a very special choral event in mid November for middle and high school treble singers! Renowned composer/conductor/clinician, Bob Chilcott, will be coming from England to work with our CFTC singers, along with singers from a few other choirs on the weekend of November 15-17, 2013. A grand concert will result on that Sunday afternoon.

We will offer a mini semester in preparation for that event that will run from mid-late Aug through the festival date in mid-November. We sincerely hope that many of our summer singers will be able to join us for this tremendous opportunity, even if they cannot join us for the entire academic year. The summer singers have done several pieces by Mr. Chilcott over the years and those selections are always favorites! Please watch our website and future mailings for a kick-off date of rehearsals and fun to introduce the exciting repertoire chosen for the occasion and a rehearsal schedule. We are very excited about this venture, which has been in planning stages for nearly two years!

Please pass this letter along to anyone you may know who was considering our festival for 2013 or might be interested in the Chilcott Choral Event! We look forward to holding the summer festival again in 2014!

Thank you for your interest in and support of our program, and we hope to see you in August!

Most sincerely,

Steve Taylor
President, Cappella Festiva Board of Directors

For additional membership information contact us at 845-853-7765 or info@cappellafestiva.org

Cappella Festiva, PO Box 2111, Poughkeepsie, NY 12601