Empowered by PeaceWorksAbout the Choir
The Choir
The DaCapo Chamber Choir was founded in 1998 in Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, under the direction of Leonard Enns. The mission of the DaCapo Chamber Choir is to identify, study, rehearse, and present in public performance and recordings, the outstanding choral chamber works of the past 100 years and to champion music of Canadian and local composers.
Our performance season consists of three annual concerts in Kitchener-Waterloo: once in the fall around Remembrance Day, a mid-winter, and a spring concert. In addition, the choir performs on an ad hoc basis at other events.
We have worked with numerous choral groups, musicians, and composers since our inaugral season, including the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony, Elora Festival Singers, Kingston Cantabile Choirs, Guelph Chamber Choir, Penderecki Quartet, Lachan Chamber Choir, Willem Moolenbeek, Eric Friesen, Bruce Dow, and Eric Whitacre, to name just a few.
DaCapo was awarded first place in the Contemporary Choral Music category
of the 2011 National Competition for Canadian Amateur Choirs. The
choir also received 2nd place in the 2011 Chamber Choir category.
Also in 2011, DaCapo's second recording, ShadowLand, has received the 2010 National Choral Recording Award from the Association of Canadian Choral Communities.
For information about how to audition for the choir, please email
auditions@dacapochamberchoir.ca .
The Director
Conductor and composer Leonard Enns is the founding director of the DaCapo Chamber Choir. He is the undergraduate advisor in Music at Conrad Grebel University College, University of Waterloo, teaching music theory, composition, and conducting. Currently he directs the UW Chamber Choir, having directed the Conrad Grebel Chapel Choir for over three decades, and served as chair of the Music Department for many years. He has released six CDs with the CG Chapel Choir over the past fifteen years. He has served as guest conductor for the Elora Festival Singers, the Region of Waterloo High School Choral Festival, and other choirs and festivals.
Also active as composer, Enns has been honoured with a 2010 JUNO nomination for his Nocturne, as Classical Composition of the Year. His current project is the upcoming premiere of Ten Thousand Rivers of Oil, commissioned by the University of Guelph and composed at the Leighton Colony of the Banff Centre; the half hour work for choir and chamber ensemble will be premiered in Guelph and Waterloo in fall 2010. Recent publications include releases from Gentry Music (Beim Kronenwirt) and ECS Publications (Songs of Innocence). Other publishers of his music include Boosey & Hawkes, Gordon V Thompson, and Kelman Hall. His works are recorded by a number of Canadian choirs, including the Elora Festival Singers, the Winnipeg Singers, the Toronto Children’s Chorus, and others, including, of course, the DaCapo Chamber Choir. Enns is an associate composer of the Canadian Music Centre, which is also a library for many of his works.