THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, May 16, 1996 TAG: 9605160036
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LEE TEPLY SPECIAL TO THE DAILY BREAK
LENGTH: Long : 106 lines
WHEN Donald McCullough conducts the McCullough Chorale for the last time in a pair of concerts this weekend, some will say that it is the end of an era.
Another way of looking at it is as the culmination of a long and steady progression of achievements.
That road has now led to a new job in Washington, D.C., as leader of the highly respected Paul Hill Chorale, a 180-member choir that often performs at the Kennedy Center.
McCullough is fulfilling his dream.
``I want to be conducting in front of the most competent musicians,'' he said. ``to use all of my abilities and to feel that someone is challenging me.''
McCullough came to Norfolk fresh out of school, after completing degrees in organ and vocal performance at Stetson University in Deland, Fla., and master's degrees in sacred music and vocal performance at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.
J. Shepherd Russell, senior pastor at Norfolk's First Presbyterian Church, recalled that McCullough was hired as the church's director of music primarily because of the recommendation of the dean at SMU, who called McCullough one of the finest students there in several years.
Some at the church were skeptical because of McCullough's youth and relative inexperience, Russell said. And much rebuilding of the music program was necessary. But it became one of the best-regarded church music programs in the area.
Russell cited McCullough's tremendous energy and unusual administrative abilities as prime reasons for his success with a variety of choirs in the large church. He started the church's Academy of Music, as well as its Music Series, which brings nationally recognized musicians to perform. He also oversaw the planning and building of the new organ.
McCullough made music an extremely important part of the church's life, both on Sunday mornings and throughout the week. Indeed, choir members come to rehearsals for more than the musical instruction.
Ann Scholten, a former choir member, said McCullough used music to help the singers ``connect with their own inner spirituality. We need this experience to offset the pressures of the modern world.''
One of McCullough's most notable achievements has been the creation and tremendous development of his chorale. It began in 1984 quite casually over drinks with students in the church music class he was teaching at Virginia Wesleyan College. They got the idea for a group that would study in depth the repertoire for small chorus.
First called the Norfolk Pro Musica, it began with an emphasis on Renaissance and Baroque music. As the mission expanded, and the name was changed to Virginia Pro Musica, the programs gradually expanded to include music of all periods, and in recent years music of the 20th century has been emphasized.
A strong connection developed between the group and Adolphus Hailstork, composer and professor of music at Norfolk State University. The chorale performed almost all of his a cappella music and, somewhat to McCullough's surprise, they found that the general public, usually musically conservative in taste, liked it.
After special concerts of Hailstork's music in 1994, the chorale produced a compact disc.
Hailstork calls the chorale the ``best chorus in Virginia,'' singling out their beauty of tone - the perfection in every vowel they sing.
JoAnn Falletta, music director of the Virginia Symphony, compared McCullough with choral conductors around the country and called him ``one of the best . . . I have ever worked with.'' They worked together on Handel's ``Messiah,'' Verdi's Requiem, and Mahler's Symphony No. 2.
McCullough formed the Virginia Symphony Chorus in 1990; its first concert was Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Their 1996-97 season will be one of their busiest, including Prokofiev's ``Alexander Nevsky,'' Orff's ``Carmina Burana,'' Vivaldi's ``Gloria,'' as well as ``Messiah.'' They will also premiere a new Hailstork piece at Norfolk State University.
McCullough will direct the Symphony Chorus next season. But as that work continues, he has already started his new job with the Paul Hill Chorale. Hill, who is retiring for health reasons, started the group in 1967. The 180-member choir is the only such organization in the D.C. area to have a paid core of professional singers.
In addition to presenting its own concerts, the chorus has sung regularly with the National Symphony Orchestra, under such conductors as Antal Dorati, Neville Marriner and Mstislav Rostropovich. One of McCullough's first taskes will be to prepare the group to sing Maurice Ravel's ``Daphnis and Chloe'' under the direction of Leonard Slatken.
One of McCullough's first jobs will be to re-audition the whole choir.
McCullough said that re-auditioning will help him understand and work with the individual voices that need to be blended, just as a painter mixes his colors.
He will also develop ideas for a new recording.
McCullough plans to spend only half of each week in Washington. The rest of the time he will be in Norfolk, continuing his work at First Presbyterian Church and with the Symphony Chorus. ILLUSTRATION: Color photos by Martin Smith-Rodden<
In Norfok's First Presbyterian Church, Don McCullough conducts his
last chorale rehearsal. The choir began as Norfolk Pro Musica in
1984.
McCullough will lead the Paul Hill Chorale.
KEYWORDS: PROFILE
by CNB