{Kickstarter} Grace Alone

So, hey, All!

I thought I should let the dust settle on my last fundraising effort before I started in on something else, but I need to let you know about a great project that you can be a part of from the ground up.

Have you heard of Kickstarter? It's an online way of raising money, but the donor actually gets something in return for donating. Also, you don't actually give any money until all the money has been pledged. The "kicker" is that is has to be done within a 30-day time limit.

So, what's this great project?

All my readers should be familiar with the singing group I'm a part of, Deo Cantamus, so it should come as no surprise that the organization is working with a local musician and composer, Josh Bauder, to record 11 hymns. The hymn texts are not necessarily new, but the music is.

Josh is a brilliantly talented, grad student who goes to my church, and I've been privileged to sing his work before. In fact Jen, Jess and I sang one of his songs at my mom's church ladies lunch just a few weeks ago. Also, the Deo Cantamus group has also sung some of his works in previous concerts.

So, on to the point of my post...

Please go to the Grace Alone Kickstarter page to learn more about the project directly from Josh himself, as well as the Deo Cantamus leader, Al Hawkins. They've put together a great video. After you watch the video, you can pledge to donate $1, $10, $25, $50, or $100. Each level of donating has a little incentive gift - i.e. if you give $10, you will get a free download of the album when it's released.

So, what are you waiting for?!
 
Go donate! Thanks for participating in this great opportunity!

{Deo Cantamus} YouTube Channel

If you missed our Spring concert, be sure to checkout the Deo Cantamus YouTube channel to see videos from this concert as well as past concerts.

2013 - Dad's in the front row, left.  Jen's in the front row, center. I'm in the 2nd row, right.

Here's one of my favorites - How Sweet the Name of Jesus Sounds - by Josh Bauder (from our church):



Here's the theme song - Our God is God - by Joseph Martin:

 

{you're invited}

Three in my family are singing this year - me, Jen and Dad.

You don't want to miss the Deo Cantamus Concert!

Saturday, March 23 at 7pm

at Fourth Baptist Church

Bring the whole family!

Here's a song we sang at a previous concert with the kid's of Let the Children Praise choir:

More videos on
Deo Cantamus website
Deo Cantamus YouTube


See you Saturday!

{Deo Cantamus} Tune My Heart Concert

Yesterday my dad and I began rehearsing with the Deo Cantamus chorale for our upcoming concert Tune My Heart. We'll be singing Saturday, March 24th at 7:00 pm and

You're invited!!

Tune My Heart Program

Nun danket alle Gott - Johann Pachelbel
Te Deum - John Rutter
Come Thou Fount - arr. by Mack Wilberg
Day by Day - arr. by James Anderson
God Be In My Head - Joshua Bauder
Do Not I Love Thee, O My Lord - Craig Curry

Click here to listen to songs from past concerts on Deo Cantamus' YouTube channel.

 Read more about my experiences with Deo Cantamus here.

{Deo Cantamus} In Awesome Wonder Concert

Just wanted to share a little bit of the recent Deo Cantamus concert with you my faithful readers. Below is my playlist from YouTube with the 6 songs I had the privilege to be a part of.

Enjoy!



There are a also more songs on the Deo Cantamus Youtube Channel that the "Let the Children Praise" choir sang at our concert.

Can you guess what my favorite song is? (Hint: If you saw the post on fb, you already know!)

What's your favorite?!

{deo cantamus concert} - Saturday, April 2nd @ 7pm

Two weeks until the concert!

You can find pictures from past events here. You can listen to past events here.

Invite your friends - I'll see you there!

From “Masterworks of Choral Music” to “Great Hymns of the Faith,” the Deo Cantamus chorale and Let the Children Praise honor choir come together to present a program that is worshipful, inspirational and edifying.

The program will focus on the unconditional love of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. The audience will hear music that glorifies our great God and draw our hearts to the message of the cross, including the world premier of “God Be In My Head” by Joshua Bauder.

The concert begins at 7:00 p.m. and will be held in the auditorium at Fourth Baptist Church in Plymouth, MN. There is no charge for admission, but a free-will offering will be taken.

busy month

Yeah! it's finally November!! (November 2nd, to be exact. Did you vote?!!!) October was such a busy month with an event or two or three every weekend!

Oct 2 - Sunday dinner at new friends from church

Oct 9/10 - Client event for work at Chanhassen Dinner Theater (missed a Deo Cantamus Rehearsal); attended my nephew's last Sunday afternoon soccer game

Oct 15/16 - attended (free) play @ PAC in Burnsville with Lindsay; Deo Cantamus Rehearsal

Oct 22/23/24 - two Deo Cantamus Rehearsals and the Concert; work reception desk at church during SS and help in nursery for pm service

You can listen to 6 songs from our concert here: http://www.youtube.com/user/DeoCantamus. The world premier of Josh Bauder's Psalm 149 was especially well received.

Oct 29/30/31 - entertained my niece overnight - watch movies, clean out my car and did some shopping; celebrated my sister's 37th birthday; attended (free) play @ Theater in the Round with Lindsay, again!

...and that was just the weekends!

Oh, yes, work has been super busy too! It seems like in the fall (right after Labor Day to be precise) everyone decides to do the business that was recommended to them over the past 6+ months. Which means lots of processing or form re-generating because the original paperwork is outdated...

One thing I was looking forward to at work was the tour of our new building! We aren't moving until Fall 2011, but we got to tour the new facilities a few weeks ago. Here's a link to the buildings' website: http://701executivesuites.com/facilities.html and a collage of views from pics I took on the 15th floor:

I've been wanting to make my plans for Thanksgiving, but just wanted to get through October! Now that I've written it out here and review the pics from this month, it doesn't seem like that much, then again, maybe it does.

So, what are your Thanksgiving plans?!

dead sea scrolls, singing, and sweet rides

Two weekends ago Anna was here for a long weekend. She drove up in her sweet new ride: Nissan Maxima. It was an especially big deal since she's only been driving department issued vehicles for almost a year.

It was a busy weekend for me since I had 5ish hours of practice for Deo Cantamus and a 2 hour concert to fit in on Friday night and Saturday. I've included a video clip below.

In between my practices, we enjoyed several meals at Jen & Eric's as well as a many rounds of Wii that Anna brought with her. I'm thinking I want to add a Wii to my wish list. We had a lot of fun, and Ethan even got into the action!

I took a half day off work on Monday and after lunch at Brit's, Anna & I visited the exhibit of the Dead Sea Scrolls at the Science Museum of MN. After the exhibit we strolled the area near the museum in downtown St. Paul. Enjoyed hanging out with my lil-cop sis!

you're invited

Come hear me sing with my choir!

Saturday, December 19, 6:00 p.m.

Sunday, December 20, 6:00 p.m.

Fourth Baptist Church choir, orchestra, handbells and other musicians combine to present a meaningful and unique program of music with a relevant message from God's Word in celebration of Christ's birth.

Please accept my invitation to attend this year's Christmas Musicale.

And for more listening pleasure here is a videow that I forgot to blog about, but is certainly worth watching: Deo Cantamus Clips from Performance on 10/24/2009. Enjoy!

you're invited

Deo Cantamus Choral* presents...

From "Masterworks of Choral Music" to "Great Hymns of the Faith," the Deo Cantamus** chorale and Let the Children Praise honor choir come together to present a program that is worshipful, inspirational and edifying.

Admission cost is $6.00 and tickets will be available at the door. The concert will be held in the auditorium of Fourth Baptist Church.

Fourth Baptist Church
Plymouth, MN

March 28, 2009
7:00 p.m.

*I'm singing in the chorale!

**My sister Jen is on the Deo Cantamus board of directors.

list maker's success story

I got to cross off two major things from my TO DO list, all in one weekend!

My weekend started out by leaving work on Friday and meeting my new landlord to sign the lease. Yep, you heard me: I signed a lease for my new apartment! This is exciting news considering it was about 10 days ago that I made the call to see about availability and probably two weeks ago that I started digging around the internet for leads on a new place. In case you forgot, or don't know, I have to move b/c my sister's getting married!

I didn't end up needing the internet's assistance b/c I got a sweet deal of a place with Christian landlords and neighbors to boot! In fact, it's b/c of my SIL's sister Lindsay! that I found my new place. Lindsay! shares one of the upstairs apartments with another friend from church (Elizabeth) and my hairdresser (Megan) and another church friend (Sarah) share the other upstairs apartment. Now we just need someone we know to move across the hall from me! So do we have any takers out there?! Yes? Maybe? OK, at least think about it, will ya?!

The apartment is in the same area that I currently live, so that is reassuring to me. The one-bedroom apartment is just my size. The nice living space with an open kitchen/living room area has lovely hardwood (or hardwood-like) and tiled floors. The kitchen will have a new counter top by the time I move in and there's a small bathroom and plenty of closet space (I hope). I can't wait to decorate! Oh, and there's a laundry area just next door to my apartment. I'm used to having the washer/dryer just outside my room so I'm not really giving up anything here!

So my weekend continued with an evening of celebrating by myself. Jess was coaching at a basketball tournament so she was a little preoccupied. Then on Saturday I enjoyed sleeping in until I had to go sing for four hours. Yes, 4 hours! My Deo Cantamus group has a concert the end of March so we have lots to work on (German, Latin, etc.). We did break for lunch and I joined a new(er) friend, Char, for lunch at D'amicos & Sons. D'amico's is a place I had never been. We each had the salad sampler and of course it was delicious. We didn't have time to enjoy all of it b/c we had to hurry back to our practice. A fellow singer had already given us a hard time about probably being late so we felt a little guilty, but not much!

Later this afternoon I headed to the mall to do a little bridesmaid* dress shopping. I wanted to get one attempt under my belt since this is not something I looked forward to and thought the final purchase would take several different excursions. Well, little did I know that I would find two options after trying only only four dresses! As they say in my country, "Sometimes JCP come through for you!"--right, Jess?! ;) I haven't tried on the dresses for anyone else, so I may need a couple of sister-opinions to seal the deal, but I'm just excited that I have options! :)

Tomorrow is going to be a full day as well. After church Lindsay! and I are heading to a farewell performance of Topel. Who's Topel, you say? Well, you didn't say if you are a Fiddler on the Roof fan**. As a young girl I watched Fiddler on the Roof many, many times. I don't think I could sit through the movie again (in one sitting), but I'm excited to see it live and in person! After an afternoon of singing***, guess what I'll do before our evening service? Yep, I'll be at choir practice! :)

All in all, a very successful weekend for one list maker who, this time, didn't even have to add things to her list in order to cross them off!

Edit Sunday, March 1: Lindsay! and I didn't get to attend Fiddler's as planned. When we got there the tickets were all sold out! We discussed how maybe if we had left right after church to go we would have made it in time, but then consoled ourselves with the fact that even if we had waited in line they still might have been sold out by the time we got to the front...

*Jess has given us 7 bridesmaids pretty much just one stipulation for our dresses: black.

**I'm not really a fan per se b/c I didn't know about it being Topel's farewell tour until after we made the decision to go see the performance...

***Did you know I liked singing so much?!

deo cantamus concert

You may recall that previously I claimed to "know latin", but let me confirm that once again I have proven not to be a linquist. I was able to demonstrate this skill last night at my third Deo Cantamus concert. Overall the concert was a success, as God was honored through the music we sang and our guest pianist played. It was personnally successful as I only messed up a few times in the Magnificat...hopefully very quietly...I just can't seem to get the latin syllables out in time with the notes! Thankfully we ended the concert with several sacred songs with words that I could pronounce.

Part One-Deo Cantamus Choral
Magnificat.....Giovanni Battista Pergolesi(1710-1736)
I. Magnificat (My Soul Doth Magnify God)
II. Et Misericordia(And His Mercy Is Upon Them)......Kristin Jorgenson, soprano and Jan Beacham, contralto
III. Deposuit Potentes (He Hath Put Down the Mighty)
IV. Suscepit Israel(He Hath Helped Israel)......John Weigel, tenor and Jeff Erickson, baritone
V. Sicut Locutus Est (As It Was Promised)
VI. Sicut Erat In Principio (As It Was in the Beginning)

Part Two-Nathan Burggraff, Pianist
Be Still, My Soul
Eight Fantasias on Two Themes by Sibelius.....Arr. by George Yurick
I. Prologue: Birth
II. Lullaby: Childhood
III. Fantasia: Youth
IV. Aria: Love
V. Waltz: Dance of Life
VI. Ballade: Reflections
VII. Chorale: Death and Transfiguration
VIII. Epilogue

Part Three-Deo Cantamus Choral; Nathan Burggraff, Pianist; Joanna Yi, Violinist
Jesus Paid It All.....Arr. by Robert Sterling
A Mighty Fortress.....Arr. by Nathan Burggraff
Be Thou My Vision.....Arr. by Dan Forrest
The Thrill of Knowing Jesus.....Arr. by Joanna Yi
Great Is Thy Faithfulness.....William M. Runyan
Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing.....Arr. by Mack Wilberg

Deo Cantamus Theme Song
Do Not I Love Thee, O My Lord?.....Craig Curry

Enjoy the pics from our warm-up and a couple from the actual concert:

i know latin...

...well, I sang Latin, anyway.

I'm part of a group called Deo Cantamus. We've had two concerts since I joined the group last fall. Our first concert was a collection of sacred songs--not all that well known to me, but gave me a good challenge, something to work on.

Let me tell you, singing Latin was a lot easier than I thought it would be. We had three 3 1/2 hour practices and one 2 hour practice, and wah-la, a concert. Pretty amazing, if you ask me. After the first two practices, I was very skeptical of my foreign language abilities, especially while singing. But after the 2nd to last practice, it seemed to gel. I felt a lot better about getting up in front of 100+ strangers and singing like a "professional". :)

This is the rehearsal recording we used for practicing on our own; it's not actually us singing. I'm not sure if I'll be able to figure out how to post that: