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Classical Review: The Two Cultures, 2025 STL Edition
World premiere caps the start to the SLCC's 70th season
George Yeh of St. Louis Arts Scene
October 15, 2025
Two Sundays ago (October 5), the Saint Louis Chamber Chorus (SLCC) and its artistic director Philip Barnes began its 2025-2026 season on familiar ground, Third Baptist Church in Grand Center, in contrast to last season where the SLCC gave its six 2024-2025 concerts in venues all new to the ensemble. Performed to an audience of about 180, the program's theme was "Science: From Leonardo da Vinci to Albert Einstein", with 13 works and composers on the printed program, with 7 living composers in the group. 5 compositions were repeat visitors from past seasons, and a world premiere capped off (almost) the concert.
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The second item in this set was the first of the afternoon's SLCC premieres, "Totality" by the Australian-born, now America-resident Melissa Dunphy (born 1980), a past composer-in-residence with the SLCC. [Dr.] Dunphy wrote her own text, inspired by her experiences of two total solar eclipses, but also with ancient Greek texts by Archilochus and Pindar in the wake of the total eclipse in 648 B.C.E., so that this work used the actual Sun as the impetus.
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The SLCC did their usual very fine work throughout the concert. At least to this reviewer with degrees in science (neither astronomy nor physics), the 'scientific' aspects of the selections were quite minimal, but that was no surprise. The 2025-2026 season marks the 70th for the SLCC, and this concert made for a stellar (pun only slightly intended) start to their anniversary commemorations.