CLASSICAL MUSIC : King’s Singers Commands Wealth of Musical Realms

The King’s Singers, Great Britain’s popular six-man vocal ensemble, has been bringing choral music into mainstream performance venues for 21 years. Equally at home singing on the “Tonight” show or performing with a symphony orchestra, the King’s Singers’ success has a lot to do with their breaking down musical stereotypes.

“The early music buffs who come to hear us are often surprised to find that they are also enjoying one of our Beatles medleys, while those who come for the popular stuff discover that Renaissance music can also be pleasurable,” said countertenor Alastair Hume, one of the ensemble’s founding members. The King’s Singers takes its name from King’s College, Cambridge, where the original members were choral scholars.

“We’ve sprung out of the mainstream of British tradition,” Hume said, “the church and cathedral choral tradition, which we have taken as our solid foundation. Although as we have branched out, we’ve attempted to adapt our approach to each type of music to keep it stylistically correct.”

The King’s Singers will perform at 8 p.m. Friday at Point Loma Nazarene College’s Brown Chapel. Typical of the a cappella group’s lack of provincialism, it will open with a medley of American folk songs arranged by Robert Chilcott, the group’s tenor. Chilcott moonlights as a composition instructor at London’s Royal Academy of Music, although singing with the group--it gives about 100 performances a year--is a full-time occupation, Hume says.

“We may be seeing an unexpected resurgence of interest in choral music,” Hume said. “In addition to the vocal teachers and choir directors who come up after concerts to talk to us, I’ve noted recently that more classroom teachers thank us for giving choral music a new-found credibility, especially with their students. When they see us on Johnny Carson’s show singing an Italian madrigal while playing a game of cards, choral singing appears less esoteric.”

Stylish and eclectic are two terms that fit the King’s Singers attitude toward choral and vocal repertory. Upcoming albums include a collaboration with jazz icon George Shearing, a disc devoted to the classic popular tunes of George Gershwin and Harold Arlen, and an album of Italian Renaissance secular music with lute and viol accompaniment.

Almond to the rescue. Violinist Frank Almond Jr. got the San Diego Symphony off the hook by agreeing to play Mozart’s Third Violin Concerto at the orchestra’s 2 p.m. Sunday concert. Violinist Jaime Laredo will play the Thursday and Friday programs at Symphony Hall as previously scheduled, but a last-minute conflict required Laredo to return to the East Coast before the Sunday concert. A native San Diegan who makes his home in New York City, Almond was a laureate winner in Moscow’s 1986 International Tchaikovsky Competition. This will be his debut with the local orchestra.

At San Diego State University, where Almond has been artist-in-residence on a part-time basis for the past two years, music department chairman Martin Chambers announced that Almond will continue to serve in that capacity for the next three years, adding some studio teaching responsibilities to his performing and coaching duties at the university.

“Even though this is a greater commitment to be on campus, everything is flexible and will be arranged around his performing schedule. We don’t want to infringe on his rising performing career.”

Our debt to Dett. Eileen Moss’ San Diego Civic Chorale will present the local premiere of Nathaniel Dett’s oratorio “The Ordering of Moses” at 7 p.m. Feb. 25 in UC San Diego’s Mandeville Auditorium. William Henry Curry, winner of the 1988 Stokowski Conducting Competition, who recently completed his tenure as the Indianapolis Symphony’s associate conductor, will be guest conductor. Dett (1882-1943) was a distinguished African-American composer whose works have recently begun to enjoy an overdue revival.

Loss to San Diego music. Local musicians mourned the passing of classical guitarist Roberto Torres on Feb. 9 at Alvarado Hospital. The 59-year-old Torres, a Mexico native, performed and taught extensively in the area. In the early 1960s, he also taught classical guitar at UC Berkeley.

Fred Benedetti, performer and chairman of the Grossmont College music department, recalled Torres, his first guitar instructor.

“In his earlier years, Torres was internationally known. In the 1960s, he set up the first local classical guitar studio, which he called Casa de la Guitarra in La Jolla. He was an inspiring teacher of the old school, who gave praise rarely. But when he gave it, you knew he was really pleased.”

SYMPHONY NOTES: Hiroko Kunitake, a 15-year-old pianist who attends La Jolla High School, won the San Diego Symphony’s Young Artist Concerto Competition last weekend. In addition to receiving a $500 prize, Kunitake will perform the final movement of Grieg’s A Minor Piano Concerto with the orchestra at Symphony Hall in the March 28-29 Young People’s Concert and the April 1 family concert. Kunitake is a student of Jane Smisor Bastien of La Jolla. Violinist Cheryl Norman won the $300 second prize, and pianist John Leppert won the $200 third prize. . . .

Soviet Georgian conductor Jansoug Kakhidze, one of the musical stars of last fall’s Soviet arts festival, will return to conduct three Symphony Hall concerts March 23-25. He replaces scheduled conductor Leopold Hager. To Kakhidze’s program the orchestra has added Henri Tomasi’s Trombone Concerto, featuring principal trombone Heather Buchman.