Members of the Clendenin Community Chorus gather for one of five rehearsals in preparation for Sunday’s 75th anniversary presentation of G.F. Handel’s “The Messiah.” The chorus, which gathers annually for the concert, is open to anyone who likes to sing and will commit to attending rehearsals.
By Monica Orosz
Charleston Daily Mail
Clendenin’s Community Chorus has a long history in this northern Kanawha County city, though its mission is focused on one work: G.F. Handel’s “The Messiah.”
For 75 years, singers here have gathered once a year to rehearse the oratorio about Jesus the Messiah that most often is performed during the Christmas and Easter seasons.
If you show up and commit to learning the music, you’re part of the choir. With the exception of solo parts, tryouts never have been required.
The concert itself — the 75th anniversary concert is Sunday — is free.
And whether there are 25 voices or 60, the concert always is well received as a gift to the community.
“I want to believe we are being respectful to Handel and we are serving God. I would hope that anyone who comes to hear it views it from that perspective,” said longtime director H.G. Young III, a professor at West Virginia University-Parkersburg and a Clendenin native…
