The Formation of A Cappella Choirs at Northwestern University, St. Olaf College, and Westminster Choir College

Abstract

Many types of groups are performing an ever expanding repertoire with an increasing variety of resources and with techniques far better than those employed even ten years ago. The present state of choral music in our country was achieved through series of developments which are easily forgotten by those who lived through these developments and which are unknown to many younger choral directors. A great debt is due to the leaders in the field who paved the way and made possible the present sound condition of choral music. One of the most significant aspects of this choral development was the collegiate cappella choir. This type of choir was responsible for great improvement in the techniques of choral singing, and it created need for more and better literature, as well as raising standards of music in the churches and high schools. Unaccompanied choral singing has been practiced for centuries-from Biblical times, through Gregorian chant, organum, descant, polyphony, to the present day. The term a cappella choir, however, would seem to be twentieth-century creation. In the late 1920's, during the 1930's, and into the early 1940's there was particular type of choral ensemble which was commonly known as an cappella choir, term which, at that time, was used only in regard to this particular type of organization. These cappella choirs tended to exhibit certain characteristics which were both indigenous and peculiar to this kind of ensemble. Such choirs