Elmhurst Choral Union to perfrom anniversary concert

With its Sunday, April 22, concert, “Spiritual Romantics,” Elmhurst Choral Union celebrates 60 years of singing.

Featured music includes someone who has never appeared in their concerts — Romantic-era composer Anton Bruckner.

The April 22 concert also includes someone else who first appeared at an Elmhurst Choral Union concert in 1961, soprano Kay Benzin of Elmhurst.

“Kay is the closest we come to an original singer. She joined us at the moment we changed from a student-faculty ensemble to a community-college partnership,” said Gail Mrozak, who handles marketing for Elmhurst Choral Union.

Benzin was a young mother and homemaker when she responded in fall 1961 to a local newspaper notice announcing that the ensemble was now open to singers in the community.

“It said they were singing Handel’s ‘Messiah’,” remembered Benzin, “and I’d never sung it.”

Benzin has since sung several performances of “Messiah” and other choral masterworks. She is the only singer in the group to have sung under Elmhurst Choral Union founding conductor T. Howard Krueger and his three successors.

Like the first student concert in 1952, Benzin’s first performance in 1961 was given with piano and organ accompaniment, a far cry from the full orchestra of professional instrumentalists now accompanying the ensemble.

“I have thoroughly enjoyed the music and the experiences here,” said Benzin. “I joined and I stayed.”

Elmhurst Choral Union and Orchestra perform Bruckner’s Mass No. 1 in D Minor and the Pilgrims’ Chorus from Wagner’s Tannhauser at Hammerschmidt Chapel, Elmhurst College at 3 p.m. Sunday, April 22. Tickets, information and clips from past concerts are available at www.elmhurstchoralunion.org.

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