Portland State University Chamber Choir

Appears on: New Year’s Concert in Portland – Beethoven's Ninth , George Gershwin: 125th Celebration with the Oregon Symphony, and Mozart's Requiem

Classics Today calls The Portland State Chamber Choir “amongst the finest choirs in the world.” Since its founding in 1975, the Chamber Choir has performed and competed in venues across the country and around the world, earning over 30 medals and awards in international choir competitions including being the only American choir to have won the Seghizzi International Competition for Choral Singing in Italy in 2013, and the Bali International Choral Festival in Indonesia in 2017. The Chamber Choir’s 2017 album The Doors of Heaven is the only album by a University chorus to hit #1 on the Billboard Classical Chart and their 2020 release Translations was named an Album of the Year by both Gramophone and Stereophile. The Chamber Choir collaborates regularly with the Oregon Symphony performing everything from Handel’s Messiah to the soundtrack to Harry Potter. In 2022, they were honored to represent the United States at the World Choral Exposition in Portugal celebrating the 40th Anniversary of the International Federation for Choral Music, and in 2025 they will headline the Jeju International Choir Festival and Symposium in South Korea.

Ethan Sperry is the Barre Stoll Professor of Choral Music at Portland State University, Gil Selley Artistic Director and Conductor of the Oregon Repertory Singers, and editor of the Global Rhythms series for earthsongs music, one of the best-selling choral series in the world. Choirs under his direction have performed at over a dozen ACDA and NAFME Conferences, toured over twenty foreign countries and sung at The Hollywood Bowl, The Kennedy Center, and the United Nations. Sperry has been a frequent guest conductor for composer A. R. Rahman including his performance at the 2007 Filmfare Awards, the Indian equivalent of the Oscars. Sperry also serves as a consultant for the KM Music Conservatory in Chennai, the first classical music school in India, which opened in 2009. He is also an on-air host for Sounds Choral on WWFM, the Classical Network, the only weekly radio show devoted to choral music in the United States.