Barron Breland: News

As you can tell from the date of my last news update, my new position at Creighton has kept me quite busy! Things are going extremely well for me and my choir, though. The Creighton University Chamber Choir for the first time has been invited to sing this fall at the annual Nebraska Music Educators' Association conference in Lincoln in November. This comes after a busy 2009-2010 year which included more concerts than the choir has ever performed in one season and a performance of Haydn's Lord Nelson Mass with the University Orchestra and guest soloists (Diane Owens, Wendy Eaton, Patrick O'Halloran, and Samuel Spade). The Music Department at Creighton is blossoming as well, with more Music and Musical Theater majors than ever. I'm very much looking forward to the upcoming fall, including concerts at St. John's on campus, the NMEA conference in Lincoln, and a Christmas show at the Joslyn Art Museum. I will update the calendar soon, and I hope to see as many of you at the concerts as possible!

Barron

I have officially moved to Omaha, NE, and am settling in nicely in my new position at Creighton University. My primary responsibility is the Chamber Choir, which is an auditioned ensemble of approximately 24 singers, and this semester I am happy to be teaching a Voice Class for music majors and minors and a Music Appreciation class for non-majors. I'm looking forward to teaching the music majors in their history and theory sequence next semester. As for the Choir, they are working extremely hard for their series of upcoming performances in the holiday season. I hope that you all will be able to attend Christmas at Creighton in the gorgeous St. John's Church on December 7 at 2:00 PM. The program is full of beautiful works by Bruckner, Rachmaninoff, Dett, Dubra, Tavener, and others which the acoustic of the cathedral only enhances.

It has been a smooth transition to Omaha, and I'm looking forward to making beautiful music here in the heartland!

Hope to see everyone soon,
Barron

So sorry for the delay in updates! I enjoyed a mildly eventful and mostly restful summer; the season consisted of a concert tour of Greece with the Singing Hooisers of Indiana University (the choir I conducted while on faculty at IU last academic year), an Apollo's Voice (the professional chorus for which I'm the Assistant Conductor) concert with Maestro Raymond Leppard in celebration of his 80th birthday, and a strong beginning to my dissertation. This fall I will again be joining the faculty of the Jacobs School of Music at IU, preparing the University Singers for a performance with guest conductor Dale Warland. It will be a wonderful concert!

I've added a Contact Information section to the website for your convenience, and other updates are on the way.

All the best,
Barron

A year ago, on April 20th, 2006, two of my closest friends and three other colleagues that I regularly worked with were tragically killed in a plane crash. The accident was devastating, needless to say, and this year the Jacobs School of Music planned multiple events to commemorate the lives of five rising stars in the music world. There were services at local churches, a bench dedicated at the Bloomington airport, and on the year anniversary, Friday night, there was a reading of the Faure Requiem by an ad hoc orchestra of players who knew the victims and a packed Recital Hall of volunteer singers (including friends, faculty, families of the victims, and guests). The doctoral students in the Choral Conducting department shared the conducting responsibilities, and I conducted the Agnus Dei. The entire musical event was extremely moving, and it was one of those rare and beautiful moments when an exquisite performance of a masterwork was greeted with very appropriate and unplanned silence, as opposed to thunderous applause. No one moved for four to five minutes.

I mention the reading to you now, not only to keep you up-to-date with what I am doing, but also to help keep the memory of these five extraordinary musicians alive: may the world never forget Chris Carducci, Robert Samels, Zach Novak, Garth Eppley, and Georgina Joshi.

I hope you seek them and their accomplishments out, through the web, recordings, or any other media you can use. Chris and Robert are both featured in the recordings on this website (Chris is the soloist in one of the Alexander's Feast excerpts and Robert is the narrator in the King David excerpt). Chris, Robert, and Zach are also in the chorus of any excerpt involving the University Singers.

I miss them everyday.
Barron

Just a quick note to let you know that the Voices of Light concert was a complete success! The Bach Chorale Singers, soloists, and orchestra sounded incredible, and combined with an extremely moving film, the evening was a great experience for performers and audience alike.

If you're interested, check out the Links tab for a link to an article that the Journal & Courier published about the piece and me.

More soon!
Barron

I am happy to announce that the soloists joining the Bach Chorale Singers in the performance of Voices of Light on the 24th of March are soprano Heather Youngquist, mezzo-soprano Patricia Thompson, tenor Dan Blosser, and bass-baritone Carl DuPont. What was already going to be an exciting event is now made even better with the addition of vocalists of their calibre. Hope to see you there!

Barron

Hello friends,

Please check out the calendar, and note that the concert venues for the Anglican Church music program on March 3 and 4 have been switched. Saturday's concert is at 4 in Indianapolis, and Sunday's is at 4 in Bloomington.

Hope you can make it!

Barron

Hello friends,

If you check out my calendar, you'll see two new dates! I will be participating (conducting and singing) in a concert of 20th-century music for the English Cathedral, along with a select group of singers, organists, and conductors from the IU Jacobs School of Music. The same program happens twice, once in Bloomington and once in Indianapolis. It's going to be a gorgeous program, and I hope to see you there!

Barron

Hello friends, and welcome to my new homepage!

This site will let you all know what's going on with me, where the next performance is, and give you a sampling of what I do and the music I've conducted and will be conducting. Enjoy, and be sure to sign the guestbook and check out the links to other sites!

Barron