Niwot United Methodist choir slated for 2018 trip

The Niwot United Methodist Church choir will be heading to the famous Carnegie Hall in 2018 to perform a new Christmas cantata by Pepper Choplin, a renowned composer, as part of a 200-member choir.

Choir member Mike Weiss said that the choir performs a lot of Choplin’s music, and recently began posting videos of performances online.

“We’ve done a lot of his music in the choir at church,” Weiss said. “Awhile ago we took to recording performances at the church and putting them on YouTube. Apparently someone found us on the site somehow as an audition. I guess they liked it and asked if we’d participate in the event in New York.”

The event next year will be the debut event for the new cantata — a piece of music written for voices with instrumental accompaniment which typically features vocal solos.

The choir at NUMC has 14 members total, and 11 will be taking the trip to perform, including five members of the Niwot Community Semi-Marching Free Grange Band. Those who plan to attend are Choir Director Liz Olson, Jimmy Gatch, Biff and Susan Warren, Katie Warren, Dennis Knowlden, Frank and Penny Landis, Gayle and Mike Weiss and Rick Clark. Minetta Knowlden also plans to attend as a member of the audience.

“Our church is particularly appreciative of the choir,” Weiss said. “We often get applause at the end of a piece, and people ask where we were if we don’t perform on a given Sunday.

“We feel quite appreciated. I think everybody enjoys what we do. It’s amazing to me how many people look at our videos on YouTube. I don’t know who they are, but I see the numbers. Apparently they google the name of a tune and we pop up.”

Olson, a graduate student in choral music at the University of Colorado, will head to New York City with her choir members in November. Members of the community are welcome to join the choir and participate in the trip as well, as long as space is available. The cost is approximately $800 per member, plus transportation, lodging and meals.

Attendees will head out a few days prior to the Nov. 18 show for practice. Anyone who goes will be free to stay longer if they like.

“I think we were certainly pleasantly surprised,” Weiss said. “I’m not aware that any of our friends in the choir have experienced anything like this. So there is some trepidation about it, but again we do really like this composer and we’re looking at it as an exciting experience.”

The choir will also come home to perform the new cantata at their Christmas program in December 2018.

“I think we’re all amazed here that somehow we’ve been offered this opportunity,” Weiss said. “It’s not something that any of us were even aware of. We didn’t actively pursue this, it just kind of fell in our laps. I’m not sure we’ve really come to terms with it yet.”