Just past the Wynn, in a hall behind the big pointy religious behemoth on Cathedral Way, around two dozen folks sing soaring, complicated songs about history’s Maccabean revolt against the Seleucid Empire.
It’s the inaugural evening of conductor Marek Rachelski’s 2007 Summer Choral Reading Sessions, the first incarnation of which formed last summer as the People’s Valley Chorus. A year ago the nondenominational group performed Handel’s Messiah; this go-’round, the assorted sopranos, altos, tenors and basses will present the German composer’s second most popular oratorio, Judas Maccabaeus, at multiple venues in November, backed by the equally organic, pretense-free Musica Lumina Chamber Orchestra.
“No matter what you say about Handel, it’s well-written and easy to sing,” Rachelski says from his piano bench. One part maestro, one part music teacher, he leads the semi-circle through discussions of majors, minors, fugals, arias, andantes, tenutos, open-fifths and choruses of virgins.
Rachelski emphasizes that all experience levels are free to join; the challenge is fun, healthy and inclusive, and the material—a meditation on war, freedom and the glory of finding peace, all set in a Middle-Eastern environment—is extremely timely. When he concludes, “All you have to do is take a step forward and things start to go into motion,” never have such lyrics as “words that weep and tears that speak” seemed so uplifting.