Wisconsin Chamber Choir of Madison, Wisconsin

Our Madison, Wisconsin based ensemble has established a reputation for choral excellence in the performance of repertoire ranging from Renaissance madrigals to twentieth-century avant-garde. In their short history, the 24 to 40-voice ensemble has performed over one hundred works, recorded seven CDs, and garnered praise for precision and beauty of tone. WCC has toured regionally throughout south-central Wisconsin and its environs.
Notable applause for WCC
2011 - WCC performs Haydn's Creation at the historic Madison Masonic Center.
2010 — WCC premiers Stephen Chatman’s “Nature’s Cry.”
2009 — WCC performs at the historic Richland County Performing Arts Center Auditorium.
2007 — WCC leads “sing-along caroling with Samuel Hutchison, Principal Organist and Curator of the Madison Symphony Orchestra” at Madison’s Overture Center and appears at the Wisconsin Choral Director’s Association (WCDA) convention in Madison at Bethel Lutheran Church.
2006 — WCC premiers Now Show Us Your Rainbow, a commission from Atlanta-based composer Ethan Amir Zaheri commemorating the victims of the December 2004 Asian tsunami.
2004 — WCC performs at the gala opening celebration of the Overture Center for the Arts in Madison, Wisconsin. Other participants included Dave Brubeck and Art Garfunkel.
2003 — Wisconsin Newspapers staff writer Tom Alesias chose WCC’s December performance of J.S. Bach’s Christmas Oratorio as one of the top twenty concerts of 2003 and Wisconsin Newspapers music critic, Jake Stockinger, chose WCC’s recording of J.S. Bach’s Christmas Oratorio as one of the top ten CDs of the year.
2002 — WCC is the only Wisconsin choir to perform in Rochester, Minnesota’s “A Festival of Music” and in New Hampton, Iowa’s “Carnegie Cultural Center” and WCC commissions and premiers Cincinnati composer Howard Helvey to create new choral works on the poetry of nineteenth-century New England transcendentalist poet Jones Very.
2001 — WCC pays tribute to the victims of September 11, 2001 terrorist attack in a concert at the Madison Civic Center and Wisconsin Public Radio’s “Sunday Afternoon Live at the Elvehjem” series selects WCC to perform on their live statewide radio broadcast form UW-Madison.
2000 — WCC performs at the Wisconsin Choral Directors Association’s annual convention in Appleton, Wisconsin.

The Wisconsin Chamber Choir appointed Robert Gehrenbeck Artistic Director in June 2008 after an extensive search for conductors. Director of Choral Activities at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater, Dr. Gehrenbeck

conducts the UW-Whitewater Chamber Singers, Concert Choir, Women’s Chorale, and opera and musical theatre productions. Dr. Gehrenbeck earned degrees at Macalester College (B.A.), Boston University (M.M.) and Indiana University (D.M.), with additional studies at the Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy Conservatory in Leipzig. Most recently, Dr. Gehrenbeck's doctoral dissertation on contemporary British composer Giles Swayne received the 2007 Julius Herford Prize from the American Choral Directors Association. WCC's originating director, Dr. Gary McKercher, held college and university choral positions in Nebraska, California, Kentucky and Iowa for over twenty years before venturing to Wisconsin. Choirs under his

direction were regularly recognized by American Choral Directors Association (ACDA) and Music Educators National Conference (MENC, and he remains an active guest clinician and conductor across the country. Besides conducting WCC while in Madison, McKercher conducted Madison Savoyards during his tenure in Madison. McKercher holds advanced degrees in choral music from University of Southern California (DMA), California State University, Fullerton (MA) and an undergraduate degree from Luther College, Decorah, Iowa after which he studied abroad at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, England. He studied post-doctorally at the American Conservatory in Fontainbleau, France during the summer of 1987, and in 2004 with the Tallis Scholars in Oakham, England. In the summer of 2007, Dr. McKercher left Madison for the sunny shores of San Diego to conduct the San Diego Master Chorale. The Master Chorale, under Gary's direction, was awarded the prestigious Chorus America/ASCAP Alice Parker Award for "Adventurous Programming" in 2009.