Northwestern College Choir

The Northwestern College Choir is one of the leading college choirs in the Midwestern United States, enjoying a rich history of performing primarily sacred a cappella music of all stylistic eras, hymns and spirituals, and regularly presenting major choral-orchestral works. It has toured extensively throughout the United States, and in Ukraine, Germany, Poland, Austria, the Czech Republic and Canada. A tour of Latvia, Estonia and Finland in planned for summer 2010. On two different occasions, the Choir has appeared at the American Choral Festival in Leipzig’s Gewandhaus, Prague’s Dvorak Hall as well as in Dresden’s Frauenkirche and Annenkirche, and to enthusiastic capacity audiences in prestigious concert venues in L’viv, Rivne, Luts’k and Kyiv, Ukraine. The Northwestern College Choir has appeared for state and divisional conventions of the American Choral Directors Association, and the “keynote” concert of the Minnesota Music Educators Association midwinter clinic.

In its history, the Northwestern College Choir also participated in the United States premiere of Wilhelm Stenhammar’s tone poem Sången with VocalEssence under Philip Brunelle, in a Bach motet master class with German conductor/Bach scholar Helmuth Rilling, and in a series of joint concerts with Nebraska’s professional choir Soli Deo Gloria Cantorum. Recordings of the choir have been featured on the nationally-syndicated radio broadcasts “Sing for Joy”, the Skylight Satellite Network, Minnesota and Nebraska Public Radio, and for National Public Radio throughout the country. The Choir presented the world premiere of Te Deum by the late Dutch composer Frigyes Hidas, and has performed premieres of new works by David Dickau, Eric Barnum, Linda Tutas Haugen and Peter Hamlin.

Timothy Sawyer, conductor

Timothy Sawyer is a veteran of many professional choirs, among them the Dale Warland Singers, the Oregon Bach Festival Chorus, and the VocalEssence Ensemble Singers. His conducting teachers include Helmuth Rilling, Eric Ericson, Gregg Smith, Vance George, Margaret Hillis, and Dale Warland. He has conducted choral performances throughout the United States, Europe and South America, and for state and divisional conventions of the American Choral Directors Association. He shared in a Grammy Award in 2000 with the Oregon Bach Festival Chorus. Active as a festival conductor, he has led all-state and honor choirs throughout the United States, and internationally in Hungary, the Czech Republic and Ukraine. From 1997-2004, he was associate conductor of the Minnesota Chorale, preparing choruses for performance with the Minnesota Orchestra and Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, and has served as choir director at The Colonial Church of Edina since 1995. In 2004, he became Artistic Director of the Two Rivers Chorale, a Minneapolis-based community chorus. He has been on the artistic staff of the Toronto Bach Festival, and currently serves as Associate Director of the Oregon Bach Festival’s conducting master class. He also serves as an adjunct faculty member at the International Christian Music Academy in Ukraine and is a member of the board of Music in World Cultures, an international faith-based organization at the forefront of a growing movement dedicated to the establishment and advancement of the use of music as a strategic tool in developing cross-cultural relationships.

Timothy Sawyer

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