Long Beach Chorale and Chamber Orchestra

That's Teri on the left with soprano Eve Schleich

Alto Teri McCasland is a financial advisor who has been singing with the Long Beach Chorale for seven seasons. Her favorite performance was the Brahms Requiem in the 2009-2010 season.

Teri has an extensive musical background which began with a major in music at Mansfield University. She also played string bass for the Torrington Civic Symphony, sang with the Hartford Symphony Orchestra, and currently sings with the Temple Israel Ensemble.

Her taste in music is just as extensive and includes rock ‘n’ roll, new age, classical, garage bands, and whatever else catches her fancy.

Singing with the chorale feeds her soul, Teri says. “Without this wonderful group, I would be lost,” she adds. Teri plays a very important role beyond singing with the altos: She’s our attendance keeper and manages the roster of singers, keeping it up-to-date. She also watches the time during our mid-rehearsal break and gleefully rings a bicycle bell to tell us snack time is over. Teri is also a gleeful singer and gets the whole alto section swaying along when the music moves her.

Outside of rehearsal, Teri plays golf and enjoys reading, traveling, shopping, and spending time with family and friends.

To “adopt” Teri as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

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Lindsey, a forensic engineer, is new to the chorale this season and is proud to say he’s spent exactly 0.02 years as a member of the bass section. We’re pulling for a whole number, Lindsey! So far he is most moved by the Magnificat by Cynthia MacDonald that we’re learning for December’s concert.

A native of Great Britain, Lindsey grew up singing in his grammar school chorale and church choir. These days he spends much of his free time on boats, volunteering on the brig Pilgrim in Dana Point as a crew leader and their training master and most appropriately, singing sea shanties.

As a forensic engineer, and avowed seaman, Lindsey is called in to put his skills to work as a knot analyst in helping to solve crimes where knots were used. He has also been a consultant to Dr. Phil and Dr. Drew for their TV shows. (You can visit his website at www.theknotguy.com!) How fascinating is that? Music he loves includes sea shanties, of course, as well as Simon and Garfunkel, and anything that, as he puts it, stirs his soul.

To “adopt” Lindsey as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Jenny on a hike with her dog Bailey

Jenny, by day a marketing manager, has been singing with the Long Beach Chorale sopranos for five-and-a-half years. Her favorite pieces we’ve performed are Randall Thompson’s setting of the Robert Frost poem Choose Something Like a Star, and (of course, being a native of Germany) Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem.

Jenny tells the story of growing up in East Germany and developing her love of music. “I have been singing for all my life. As a child, I sang sitting in fruit trees in my grandparents’ garden, picking and eating fruit (until I got a tummyache) and of course singing. I guess, growing up in East Germany, there wasn’t much else to do, no Mickey Mouse to adore or video games to be played. In hindsight, I’m grateful for growing up that way. I also used to sing on a swing in my grandparents’ garden, supposedly so nicely that the neighbors would bring us cherries!”

“At the age of eight or nine, I joined a children’s choir in my home town of Gotha and it really shaped who I am today, both musically and as a person in general. I am an only child, but with an intense rehearsal schedule and frequent singing camps, the choir became my home away from home, my other family, my siblings that I never had. Eventually I got ‘kicked out’ at the age of 18.”

In college, Jenny started a small singing group with a few friends and they performed at school functions. She moved to Canada and continued her college years in Victoria, British Columbia. After graduating, she moved to Toronto and joined a women’s choir called Cantores Celestes. (You can watch a video of Jenny performing with Cantores Celestes here.) After just a year in Toronto, Jenny moved to California, found the Long Beach Chorale, and the rest is history. “Being so far away from home, the LBCCO once again has filled a void and become my other family. The caliber and people make it even that much better!” she says.

When she’s not at rehearsal, Jenny is walking her “puppy,” a 95-pound pit bull, seeking out hole-in-the-wall restaurants, going wine tasting, or listening to the Beatles, The Who, Bright Eyes, Regina Spektor (her favorite), K.D. Lang, Joni Mitchell, and other singer-songwriters.

To “adopt” Jenny as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Baritone and hairstylist-to-the-chorale, Ted has been an LBCCO singer for two years. His favorite performance was the Brahms Requiem in the 2009-10 season. When he’s not singing or cutting hair, Ted enjoys gardening and photographing his collection of flowers.Ted earned a bachelor’s degree in choral music from Cal State Long Beach, but his life has taken him in many directions over the years and at one time, he held a top secret security clearance! His favorite music to listen to includes the Black Crowes, Brahms, Aerosmith, Steve Miller Band, and Stevie Wonder.

Ted working his magic in the salon.

“Making beautiful music raises the bar for every other aesthetic pursuit in my life, and heals my spirit,” he says. We love your beautiful spirit, Ted!

To “adopt” Ted as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Jeanne is a preschool teacher and soprano singer who has been in the chorale for an impressive 17 seasons. Her favorite performance was the Beethoven Triple Concerto. She has been singing nearly all her life, beginning at age 10, and performed with various choirs in her college years. “Music is my stress release. When I listen to or sing beautiful music, I can feel my muscles unknot,” she says.Jeanne has two nieces and one nephew. In her free time she loves to read, play trivia games with friends, take care of her niece, and travel. She has visited 13 states and 25 countries. On a recent cruise, she visited Latvia, Germany, and Scandinavia.

Jeanne in Riga, Latvia

Jeanne’s favorite classical composer is Mozart. When she’s not listening to classical music, she turns the volume up to bands from the ‘80s, like New Order and Depeche Mode. Other favorites include ABBA, Celtic Thunder, and Coldplay. Rock on, Jeanne!

To “adopt” Jeanne as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Kathy, a college counselor, has been singing with the chorale for five years. Her favorite performance was Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Dona Nobis Pacem, from the 2010-11 season. Kathy’s been singing for as long as she can remember, starting in the children’s choir at her church growing up and on all the way to college. After graduating, she realized she still needed to be in a choir. Soon thereafter she discovered the chorale and found a new home. “Singing with the chorale gives me an escape from my week. It gives me a chance to be with great people who share my love for making excellent music. It’s like a mental massage every week,” she says.

Kathy also spends her time hanging out with friends, watching movies, traveling (she recently visited Iceland), and spending time with her three cats. Her favorite music includes classic rock, oldies, ‘80s music, musical theater soundtracks, and movie soundtracks. While driving in her car, she often sings along…at full volume…and occasionally with dance moves. You rock, Kathy.

To “adopt” Kathy as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:
 

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Diana, a soprano, has been in the chorale for five years. Her favorite performance was the Brahms Requiem in the 2009-10 season. “As a stay-at-home mom, I really need something challenging and interesting in my life that is just for me. Luckily, I have a completely wonderful and supportive husband, who takes over at home and pushes me out the door on Mondays for rehearsal,” she says.

When she’s not singing, Diana is driving her boys around to their various activities, and enjoys hiking with her family and reading mysteries and biographies. She says her love of music and the performing arts came from listening to her father’s opera recordings while she was growing up and studying ballet at the Louisville Ballet’s academy and during summers at the Washington Ballet School in Washington, D.C.

During her last two years of high school, Diana was in the Louisville Ballet’s junior company and performed in the corps de ballet in productions of The Nutcracker, Romeo and Juliet, and others. “Alas, I was not really good enough to pursue a professional career in such a competitive field, so I went to college and eventually ended up in Southern California,” she says. In college a friend talked Diana into auditioning for a production of Guys and Dolls at the South Bay Center for the Arts. She was in it for the dancing, but they wanted her to sing, too! Soon, like many of us, she was a certified musical theater geek.

After taking some singing and music theory classes as an undergraduate, she sang in the College Singers under Dr. John Alexander (currently the director of the Pacific Chorale) as a grad student at Northridge State, where she earned a master’s degree in European history. “That experience was terrifying and exciting at the same time. As a person who learned to read music as an adult, I was in way over my head, but I worked really hard to keep up and I learned to love choral music,” Diana says. Now she’s a soloist in her church choir at St. Gregory’s Episcopal, and she has soloed with Long Beach Chorale as well. She delighted all of us with a duet rendition of “This is the Night” from Disney’s Lady and the Tramp at the animal-themed concert at Rancho Los Alamitos in the 2009-10 season.

To “adopt” Diana as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:
 

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Elysse, an alto and a journalist, has been in the chorale for five years. Her favorite performance was the Ein Deutsches Requiem by Brahms. Her musical background includes a brief stint as a music minor in college, and a long career of singing in choirs since the second grade. “After I graduated from school I missed the music so much that I searched for choirs and auditioned for the Long Beach Chorale and Chamber Orchestra. I’m quite thrilled to be in the group!” she says. Elysse is also a member of the chorale’s marketing committee and provides her expertise in writing many of our press releases and getting our concerts posted on local events calendars. She also administers our Twitter account (@LBChorale).

That's Elysse on the left and fellow alto Claire on the right.

Elysse is sometimes confused with Claire, another alto. Both ladies are writers, after all, and even look at little bit alike!

Singing in the chorale is Elysse’s weekly moment of zen. “It gives me a few brief hours of bliss each week, where I can concentrate on making music and leave behind the cares of the work week. It’s great to have a creative outlet like this, and I love singing alongside such talented people,” she says.

Elysse’s favorite music to listen to is recordings of past concerts by the LBCCO. In fact, she admits to listening to Handel’s Dettingen Te Deum on the treadmill at the gym! She also enjoys country music, indie bands, Broadway musical cast recordings, and 1940s and 1950s standards.

Her hobbies include gardening, trying new recipes, spending time with her boyfriend, traveling, taking voice lessons, reading (she’s currently working her way through the Song of Ice and Fire series by George R.R. Martin), and going to the gym.

To “adopt” Elysse as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:
 

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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Ron is a musician and photographer, and he joined the chorale this season, helping to round out our bass section. He is a trained bassist who began his life in music as a singer and is excited to return to it.

He speaks fluent German, and thus will be happily met with the rest of the German speaking Deutsch-o-philes in the chorale. Ron can also be depended upon to bring a snack to share during our break at each rehearsal, a much-appreciated quality among members of our ranks!

So far, he especially appreciates Artistic Director Eliza’s emphasis on rhythm in her direction. His favorite music to listen to includes classical, jazz, bluegrass, and funk.

To “adopt” Ron as part of our Adopt a Singer program, click here:
 

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

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That's Julie on the left, with two other Dodgers fans.

To read more singer profiles in our Adopt a Singer campaign, click here.

Thanks for supporting the Long Beach Chorale!