'Carmina' concert is one huge show
Twenty years ago, almost to the day, the Southern Arizona Symphony Orchestra pulled off a major coup in Tucson: It assembled four community arts organizations, including the Civic Orchestra of Tucson, to perform Berlioz's "Te Deum" choral work at Tucson Music Hall.
On Friday night, in the first of three performances, the orchestra trumped itself. All told, 240 people - performers - packed the stage at Catalina Foothills High School for Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana."
"This is all amateur (choirs). It's a great stretch for all of them," said Marcela Molina, conductor of the Tucson Masterworks Chorale and Tucson Girls Chorus, two of the groups represented. The other was the Catalinas Community Choir, led by Cyndee Chaffee.
The concerts, which repeat tonight and Sunday, open with Saint-Saens' Bacchanale, which SASO played at its first concert 30 years ago. Since then, "the orchestra has just grown in depth," said Barbara Chinworth, the orchestra's founder. "It's very exciting."
