Background Statement
The Durango Choral Society (DCS) is currently in its 55th season. DCS has grown from a small group of adult singers who met for enjoyment in 1970, to an organization that has four performing choirs: the 100-voice adult mixed choir; the 16 treble voices of the Durango Women's Choir (DWC); the 48 young voices of the Durango Children's Chorale(DCC); and the 22 voices Durango Youth Chorus (DYC), serving middle school aged singers. We are proud that we now have a choir for singers of every age! DCS primarily serves La Plata County, although some of our singers and audience members come from the neighboring counties of Archuleta, Montezuma and San Juan, as well as from Northern New Mexico. The repertoire is drawn from many languages and cultures, and both the singers and the audience represent a cross section of our community. We are very committed to the opportunities the DCS provides for the youth of La Plata County. We are also committed to offering our community exemplary and diverse concerts of the highest quality. Our collaborative efforts expand each year and include works with the San Juan Symphony, Fort Lewis College Choirs, The Telluride Renaissance Singers, the Music in the Mountains Orchestra, the Santa Fe Women's Choir, and numerous instrumentalists from the Four Corners area. In addition to a delivering a world-class presentation of challenging major works in five magnificent Durango performance venues, we go on tour and our community partnerships travel with us. Though travel and collaboration we gain new understandings of various cultural and choral traditions as well as increase our visibility. Over time we have expanded our performance venues and accepted invitations to represent Colorado twice at Carnegie Hall, across Central Europe, and in Syros, Greece at the International Festival of the Aegean. The has DCS traveled to the Varna International Choral festival as performing guests in Croatia, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Salzburg. Most recently, the DCS participated in a choral festival in Oahu, Hawaii (April, 2017) the DCC performed at Carnegie Hall (May 2017) and the DCS has again been invited to perform at Carnegie Hall (June 2018) with our own Linda Mack Berven conducting. We feel that we are living up to the Colorado Creative Industries statewide objective of ensuring that "Colorado will be recognized as a premier creative hub-a home for world-class creative businesses, productions and experiences." We are proud to be dedicated Durango artists as well as ambassadors of Colorado on the international stage. We hope to proudly forefront your organization as an important, visible partner, both locally and on the stages of the world.