Recordings

MARGARET BONDS:
Credo & Simon Bore the Cross

“Margaret Bonds: Credo & Simon Bore the Cross brings new luster, and the utmost care of execution…under the baton of Malcolm J. Merriweather, The Dessoff Choirs has a profound simpatico with Bonds’ mature compositional style. The chorus is also firmly aligned with the composer’s vision, and the way in which its realization today extends a legacy.” — WRTI

MARGARET BONDS:
The Ballad of the Brown King

20th-century African American composer Margaret Bonds is receiving long overdue recognition with the world-premiere recording of her crowning achievement, The Ballad of the Brown King. Composed in 1954 and dedicated to Martin Luther King, Jr., Bonds' work with libretto by Langston Hughes, focuses on the dark-skinned Balthazar of the Three Kings.

Rough Magic & Other Recordings

The Dessoff Choirs have recorded or been featured on many albums over the years. Take a look at some of the various recordings and work performed.

Reflections: Four Contemporary American Composers Look Back (1999)

Kent Tritle, conductor
Mary Ann Hart, mezzo-soprano
David Arnold, baritone
The Dessoff Choirs

Paul Moravec: Songs of Love and War (first recording)
Robert Convery: To the One of Fictive Music (first recording)
Ned Rorem: From an Unknown Past
John Corigliano: Fern Hill (first recording of revised orchestration)

Glories on Glories (2009)

James Bagwell, conductor
The Dessoff Choirs

Recorded live in performance in March 2009, Glories on Glories features stirring American choral works by William Billings, Charles Ives, Horatio Parker, and Randall Thompson, with shape-note hymns, songs from the battlefield, and more.

This recording is available for purchase on iTunes.