Worcester Chorus & Friends: Ellington & Gershwin

Everett McCorvey, a native of Montgomery, Alabama, and a graduate of the University of Alabama where he received his degrees including a Doctorate in Musical Arts. He has given performances at the Metropolitan Opera, Kennedy Center, Radio City Music Hall, Teatro Comunale, Florence, Italy, Queen Elizabeth Hall, London, England, and in over 23 countries.

He is the Founder and Artistic Director of the American Spiritual Ensemble, a professional Ensemble dedicated to the performance and preservation of the American Negro Spiritual and he is the Conductor and Artistic Director of the National Chorale and Orchestra of New York City, a professional organization dedicated to performing the titans of the classical choral repertoire. He was recently appointed as the inaugural Principal Guest Conductor at Opera Columbus. Opera Columbus (Ohio, USA).

In his home state of Kentucky, he is the Chairman of the Kentucky Arts Council and nationally, he is an advisory panelist for the National Endowment for the Arts. Dr. McCorvey also serves on the Board of Trustees of the Sullivan Foundation of New York, an organization dedicated to identifying gifted young opera singers in the early stages of their professional careers and helping them develop through a unique program combining audition awards with continuing support for learning new roles.

He has served on the faculties of the New York State Summer School of the Arts, American Institute of Musical Studies, Graz, Austria, and Bay View Music Festival as co-opera conductor and co-director of the American Negro Spirituals Intensive Program. He holds position of the OperaLex Endowed Chair of Opera Studies and Professor of Voice at the University of Kentucky in Lexington, Kentucky

Recent conducting stints include SANCTUARY ROAD by Paul Moravec and Pulitzer Prize Librettist Mark Campbell with Virginia Opera this past February of 2024; Handel’s MESSIAH at the newly renovated David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center in December of 2023; CARMEN by Bizet in October of 2023 with Opera Columbus; SUOR ANGELICA and GIANNI SCHICCHI with the Bay View Opera Festival in the summer of 2023; MARIA DE BUENOS AIRES with Kentucky Opera in November of 2022; The World Premiere of THE SECRET RIVER by Stella Sung and Mark Campbell with Opera Orlando in December of 2021 as well as conducting the Dvořák Symphony #9 in Prague’s Smetana Hall with the North Czech Philharmonic and the Grand Finale Opera Gala at the Mythos Opera Festival 2018.

Upcoming concerts include conducting THE THREE PENNY OPERA by Kurt Weil with Opera Columbus, THIS LITTLE LIGHT OF MINE by Chandler Carter with the libretto by Diana Solomon Glover with Kentucky Opera, and TREEMONISHA by Scott Joplin with Opera Orlando. McCorvey served as the Music Director and Conductor of the World Premier of BOUNCE, The Basketball Opera, conceived and directed by Gretha Holby with the lead composer Glen Roven and author and librettist Charles R. Smith, Jr. Additional music for BOUNCE was written by Tomas Doncker and West Side Story Film Star Ansel Elgort.

Dr. Mccorvey is married to soprano, Alicia Helm and they have three children.

Praised as a pianist with “flair and energy” (The New York Times), Bösendorfer artist Dr. Michael Fennelly gained international attention upon his completion of George Gershwin’s unfinished setting of Rhapsody in Blue for solo piano, orchestra, and symphonic chorus, for which he received a knighthood in Spain. Following the premiere with the National Chorale in Lincoln Center, The Huffington Post exclaimed “[Fennelly’s performance] hit like a lightning bolt which catapulted the audience 2,000 feet in the air, taking them on a rocket-ride around the Chrysler building.”

Michael Fennelly has toured extensively on all seven continents, appearing throughout the US and Europe as well as in China, Japan, Siberia, French Polynesia, Bhutan, Dubai, Peru—from Andorra and Antarctica to Zimbabwe and Xinjiang. Concerto appearances include Rachmaninoff’s Second (Orange County Philharmonic), Brahms’ First (Altenburg Festival Germany), Saint-Saëns’ Second (Alisa Viejo Symphony), and Rhapsody in Blue (New Jersey Festival Orchestra). Dr. Fennelly represented the United States State Department on a tour of seventeen cities in Japan, and has performed in many of the world’s great concert halls, including Carnegie Hall (NY), Opéra de Monte-Carlo (Monaco), Prinzregenten Theatre (Munich), Komische Oper (Berlin), and the fabled Manaus Opera House (Brazil) in the heart of the Amazonian rainforest. Michael has performed with international opera star Renée Fleming in Manhattan, the New York Philharmonic under Alan Gilbert, and the Buffalo Philharmonic under JoAnn Falletta.

Michael Fennelly first performed at age five and made his debut concerto appearance at age ten in California. Dr Fennelly studied with Earl Voorhies (Fullerton, CA), Dr. Nelita True (Eastman School of Music) and the legendary pianist Byron Janis (Manhattan School of Music). His doctoral dissertation presented a comprehensive new theory of Metric Structure, which analyzed intermediate temporal patterns in compositions from medieval troubadours and Mozart symphonies to Verdi operas and Ligeti’s Etudes. Michael was the US winner of the Horowitz Competition in Kiev, Ukraine and made his solo Carnegie Hall recital debut upon winning the Artists International Competition.

As a staff pianist for The Juilliard School and the Metropolitan Opera, Michael has collaborated with many of the world’s most celebrated musicians including Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, Renata Scotto, Itzakh Perlman, Lorin Maazel, Richard Goode, and Leon Fleisher. Dr. Fennelly has performed recitals for the Aristotle Onassis Foundation, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Kosciuszko Foundation, the Opera Index Foundation, Licia Albanese-Puccini Foundation, Joy in Singing, and the Metropolitan Opera Guild. He also toured for many years as a member of Community Concerts, which has since the 1930’s presented artists such as Arturo Rubinstein and Vladimir Horowitz in smaller cities throughout the United States.

In recent years, Dr. Michael Fennelly has begun a second career as a conductor, leading Madama Butterfly (Amore Opera), La Traviata (Berkshire MA) and the premieres of  Les Trois Mousquetaires (Phoenicia Festival, Woodstock NY), Faustine, Big Jim (Center for Contemporary Opera), and assisted in Japan Society’s Four Nights of Dream in sold out performances in Tokyo. Dr. Fennelly was invited as assistant conductor to many prestigious music festivals (Wolftrap, Castleton, Ashlawn, Bruges) and has led innumerable chamber and operatic concerts from the keyboard.

Michael Fennelly’s solo piano albums include The Legend of Faust, Debut, and Grand Tour (Athena Records).

Michael Fennelly and his wife, soprano Megan Weston, live in Manhattan where they co-founded and are the directors of the Athena Music Foundation, a non-profit organization, whose mission to promote and present dynamic music performances to diverse audiences. Athena’s programs include a recital and chamber music series; a touring troupe, The Athenians, who have appeared in Dubai and China; and the Young Performers Program, in which students have the opportunity to study and perform with professional artists.

Under the baton of Artistic Director Chris Shepard and Assistant Director & Accompanist Mark Mummert, The Worcester Chorus of Music Worcester numbers approximately 100 professional and amateur singers who perform several times each year, primarily as part of Music Worcester’s season, including an annual performance of Handel’s Messiah. Their repertoire also includes other classical choral pieces, opera, musical theater, American folk songs, and more.

The Worcester Chorus is a key component of THE COMPLETE BACH, Music Worcester’s 11-year project to present all of J.S. Bach’s known works, which concludes in March 2035. A subset of the group, the Worcester Chorus Women’s Ensemble (dir. Mark Mummert) is also featured in the Music Worcester season.

Learn more and see their full schedule.