Press Release

Cantemus Receives Mass Cultural Council Grant

(Sept. 15, 2023) — Cantemus Chamber Chorus, with singers and audiences from across the North Shore, has received a grant of $6,000 from the Mass Cultural Council, a state agency, through its Cultural Investment Portfolio program.

This grant acknowledges the significant public value of Cantemus’ four annual thematic choral concerts. With support from the MCC and Local Cultural Councils, as well as support from corporations, foundations, businesses and individual donors in the area, the chorus brings diverse and inclusive choral programs to communities on the North Shore.

Recent concerts have included “The Poet’s Prism: Reflections on Love and Life,” with choral works from Germany, Spain, Argentina, Estonia and the U.S.; and “Old Worlds, New Worlds,” with music spanning western Christian, Russian Orthodox, and Jewish traditions.

As an organization dedicated to diversity and inclusion in its programming and outreach, Cantemus will perform James Whitbourn’s choral-orchestral work Annelies in January, in observance of International Holocaust Remembrance Day. It is the only choral work based on the texts of Anne Frank’s “Diary of a Young Girl.”

Mass Cultural Council has a budget of $15.7 million, including an appropriation of nearly $14 million from the state of Massachusetts and grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and other sources. The agency also runs the Mass Cultural Facilities Fund in partnership with MassDevelopment.

Mass Cultural Council funds reach every community in the Commonwealth. Its mission is to promote excellence, education, access and diversity in the arts, humanities and sciences, to improve the quality of life for all Massachusetts residents and contribute to the vitality of our communities and economy.

Cantemus gratefully acknowledges funding support from the Massachusetts Cultural Council and from the Local Cultural Councils of Groveland, Merrimac, Newbury, Newburyport, Salisbury and Rowley.

Cantemus is a member of Chorus America, MASSCreative, and the Greater Boston Choral Consortium, a cooperative association of diverse choral groups in Boston and the surrounding area.

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For more information contact:
Susan Nash
press@cantemus.org