Ateneo Chamber Singers debut at Church of the Gesu concert

The Ateneo College Glee Club, the country’s oldest college choral group, is hosting the launching concert of the Ateneo Chamber Singers (ACS) at the Church of the Gesu at the Ateneo Loyola Heights campus on Aug. 18, 8 p.m. The concert is entitled Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam (To the Greater Glory of God). Admission is free.

A semi-professional choir, ACS is composed of members of the Glee Club’s Batch 2000-2001 who garnered a string of first prizes in Europe in the last two years. They swept the competition away in Slovenia, Italy, Ireland, and France, bagging the coveted Grand Prix in the French city of Tours. This was followed by two more first prizes in Spain and Germany.

Nothing could quell their passion for singing together. Aflame with the desire to preserve their strong bond, the alumni reinvented their ensemble. They set themselves apart from other Philippine choirs with their new identity – sacred music, Filipino and foreign, revealing that the spirituality of St. Ignatius Loyola is ingrained in their organization.

The Ateneo College Glee Club was formed in 1921 to provide liturgical music in the Jesuit San Ignacio Church in Intramuros. Their performances were often preceded by the Ateneo Boys Choir. The Glee Club lived on to become the first choir to sing at the Sta. Maria della Strada Parish in 1980, the first Filipino group to perform in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York and at the historic Cathedral of Cologne, Germany in 1981. In 1983, it became the first non-Italian group to sing at the Pope’s General Assembly in Rome.

Wielding the baton in this concert is Jonathan Velasco, who, like Joel Navarro, the Glee Club’s musical director for more than two decades, led them in their forays into international concerts and tilts.

An all-religious program will be performed during the concert. This includes Cayabyab’s Aba Po Santa Mariang Reyna, Lotti’s Crucifixus, Brahms’ Schaffe in mir, Gott ein rein Herz, Bardos’ Libera me, Edgar’s Lux aeterna, Pater Noster and Awit sa Panginoon, both composed by group member Robin Estrada, and Dry Bones, a Negro spiritual.