The Vancouver Master Chorale’s new director, Philip Denton, will lead the 90-voice group and a 22-piece professional orchestra in two different arrangements of the Latin Mass in upcoming concerts.

The choir will perform the Mass in D Minor (Lord Nelson Mass) by Franz Joseph Haydn, and the upbeat, jazzy Mass in Blue by Will Todd at 7 p.m. May 3rd and 3 p.m. May 4th at the Vancouver First Presbyterian Church, 4300 Main Street.

The Lord Nelson Mass is considered to be one of Haydn’s greatest compositions. Haydn wrote the work in less than two months in 1798. A week before the premiere, British Admiral Horatio Nelson destroyed Napoleon’s fleet in a brilliant victory near Egypt, and the work became known as the Lord Nelson Mass.

“Mass in Blue” is an upbeat jazz setting of the Latin mass text for soprano soloist, four-part chorus and jazz combo. It was commissioned in 2003 by the Hertfordshire (England) Chorus. The work uses the text and six sections of the Catholic Mass but is based on American blues.

Todd has composed choral works, opera, musical theater and orchestral pieces, as well as jazz compositions.

Madeline Ross of Portland will be the featured soprano soloist for the Todd mass. She has sung with the Portland Opera and with numerous other opera companies as a soloist around the country. You can learn more about her background at https://madelinelross.com/about.