Chorus and Community.(Book review)

* Chorus and Community, w/CD, edited Karen Ahlquist, University of Illinois Press (www.press.uillinois.edu; (800) 621-2736), 2006. $30.

Karen Ahlquist is currently associate professor and chair of the department of music at George Washington University, where she teaches music history, music literature and ethnomusicology. She combines her knowledge of choral conducting and ethnomusicology to give readers this unique collection of essays that covers global and historical views of choirs and their places in communities. The book contains 13 well-documented essays by different authors and is divided into five units. Each author writes using his own understanding of the word "community." The choirs discussed have some elements in common, such as a director, regular rehearsals, set memberships and set repertoires.

The ability of a choir to promote a political aim is exemplified in an essay by Charles Maguire about John Curwen and his Tonic Sol-fa Method used to teach singing and help advance the Temperance Movement in England during the second half of the nineteenth century. Activism is illustrated in an essay by Jill Stachan that covers the gay and lesbian choral movement in the Washington, D.C. area. An essay by Bernard Lortat-Jacob looks at singing in a Sardinian brotherhood where a singer must give up ...