Showtime

Who: Lydia Adams and the Amadeus Choir

With: Mary Lou Fallis and Peter Tiefenbach

When: Friday, April 4 at 8 p.m.

Where: Hillfield Strathallan College's Artsplex, 299 Fennell Ave. W.

Cost: $30, student $20

Call: 905-389-1367, ext. 170

Wouldn't it be a drag if there were only one colour in the world? Well, the same holds true in the world of choral music. Wouldn't things be boring if every choir had a "white" sound?

So, don't ask Lydia Adams to stick to one colour when she's conducting her two choral groups, the Amadeus Choir and the Elmer Iseler Singers, because the plain fact of the matter is, she won't.

"I've always asked for a blended sound," said Adams. "What I love with the two choirs is that they can achieve a wide variety of sound and colour. I don't like to stick with one colour because you need different colours for different things."

And Adams will need a large colour palette tomorrow night when she and her Toronto-based Amadeus Choir visit Hamilton for a concert under the auspices of Crescendo Concerts at Hillfield Strathallan's Artsplex Theatre.

The evening's first half will contain two British classics, I was Glad by Hubert Parry, and Gustav Holst's setting of Psalm 148, as well as two of Adams's works, the Mi'kmaq Honour Song, and the Celtic Suite, a spray of seven Scottish songs. Accompanying the choir will be Hamilton's Shawn Grenke, former organist and choir director at Centenary United.

"He's just a darling," gushed Adams about Grenke.

The Amadeus Choir is a semi-professional group numbering approximately 90 choristers. Among them is a handful of professionals, most coming from the Iselers.

"This choir to me is a professional choir because of their professional attitude toward their music making," said Adams of the Amadeus Choir.

Adams learned about professionalism from Sir David Willcocks with whom she studied at London's Royal College of Music from 1976 to 1981. (On her last day in England, Adams sang in Willcocks's Bach Choir at the royal wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer.) On her return to Canada, she spent 17 years as a pianist for Elmer Iseler.

Tomorrow night's repertoire isn't limited to the Amadeus' colourful offerings. There'll also be contributions by soprano Mary Lou Fallis and pianist Peter Tiefenbach. Fallis, who won a Metropolitan Opera regional competition in 1974, has found second and third wind not just as an associate producer and judge on the TV talent show for opera wannabes, Bathroom Divas: So You Want to be an Opera Star?, but as a musical comedienne lampooning off-key amateurs (ironically similar to a few on her TV show), and divas alike.

Fallis, who was part of Crescendo's opening season two decades ago when it was the Soundfest Concert Series, will add some mirth to the proceedings with send-ups such as Bingo Night in Berlin and Clair de Lune Bleue. In the second half, she'll team with the Amadeus Choir for a work she penned with Tiefenbach, the Primadonna Choralis, a tongue-in-cheek look at the history of choral music via a kaleidoscopic treatment of prehistoric grunts, Broadway's Oklahoma!, and polyphonic, Ligetiesque speech sounds.

Leonard Turnevicius writes on classical music for The Spectator.

leonardturnevicius@hotmail.com