The Dessoff Choirs Presents Works by Adolphus Hailstork, Herbert Howells, and Tania León

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Mallory McFarland | Morahan Arts and Media
mallory@morahanartsandmedia.com | 646.378.9386

The Dessoff Choirs Presents Adolphus Hailstork’s The World Called,
Herbert Howells’s Requiem and Magnificat, and Tania León’s It’s a Journey

Conductor Malcolm J. Merriweather Leads The Dessoff Choirs
at Brick Church on November 8, 2025

“Full-bodied sound and suppleness” –The New York Times

www.Dessoff.org

September 29, 2025 (New York, NY) – The Dessoff Choirs – led by Music Director Malcolm J. Merriweather – presents the inaugural program of its 2025-2026 season, performing Adolphus Hailstork’s The World Called on Saturday, November 8, 2025 at 4:00 p.m. at Brick Church. Known for blending African, American, and European traditions and influenced by his studies with Nadia Boulanger, Hailstork’s work is based on Rita Dove's poem, Testimonial, that evokes themes of nostalgia, youth, and promise.  

The Dessoff Choirs also performs Herbert Howells’s Requiem and Magnificat - originally written for St. Paul’s Cathedral in London - featuring organist Dr. Raymond Nagem, and a reprise of Tania León’s It’s a Journey, commissioned for the ensemble’s centennial with poetry by the late Nikki Giovanni. Steven Ryan joins The Dessoff Choirs on piano.

“To begin our 101st season with the poetry of Rita Dove and Nikki Giovanni, set by Adolphus Hailstork and Tania León, alongside Howells’ Requiem, is to honor resilience and the enduring power of the choral art,” remarked Dr. Merriweather.

Described as “incredibly powerful” (Interludes) and “sustaining the high quality and thoughtful programming that have characterized the ensemble for a century and continue under Dr. Merriweather’s exceptional leadership” (Blogcritics), The Dessoff Choirs recently celebrated their 100th season in 2024.

Founded in 1924 by Margarete Dessoff, The Dessoff Choirs has been a fixture in the New York classical music scene for the past 100 years. Known for introducing unknown, long-forgotten, or newly composed works to American audiences, Dessoff’s nine music directors have expanded upon Margarete’s legacy, each in their own way. Malcolm J. Merriweather, Dessoff’s current music director, has used this podium to reintroduce the works of Black women composers, including Margaret Bonds, Florence Price, and Valerie Capers, along with commissioning new works. Dessoff continues to pay tribute to the past with works performed under Margarete Dessoff’s baton.

Program Information
Resilience and Revelation: Hailstork, Howells, & León
Saturday, November 8, 2025 at 4:00 p.m.
Brick Church | 1140 Park Avenue | New York, NY 10128
Tickets: $25-45
Link: https://www.dessoff.org/events/howells-and-hailstork 

Program:
Adolphus Hailstork - The World Called
Herbert Howells - Magnificat
Herbert Howells - Requiem
Tania León - It’s a Journey

Artists:
The Dessoff Choirs
Malcolm J. Merriweather, conductor
Raymond Nagem, organ
Steven Ryan, piano

About The Dessoff Choirs
The Dessoff Choirs, one of the leading choruses in New York City, is an independent chorus with an established reputation for pioneering performances of choral works from the Renaissance era through the 21st century. Founded in 1924 by Margarete Dessoff, the chorus celebrated its centennial during the 2024-25 season with programs that reflected music from its rich history and moved us forward into the next 100 years with new collaborations and commissions. 

The ‘s’ in Choirs connotes the group’s various incarnations – from Dessoff’s core group of 50 singers, to the Symphonic Choir assembled for larger engagements and Chamber Choir selected to present more intimate works. Since its founding in 1924, Dessoff’s mission is to enrich the lives of its audiences and members by giving voice to new or rarely heard, forgotten music and composers; and to bring great choral works to New York audiences in new ways. Dessoff concerts, professional collaborations, community outreach, and educational initiatives are dedicated to stimulating public interest in and appreciation of choral music as an art form that enhances the culture and life of these times.

With repertoire ranging over a wide variety of eras and styles, Dessoff’s musical acumen and flexibility has been recognized with invitations from major orchestras for oratorios and orchestral works. Last season included a well-received Brahms’s Requiem at Town Hall, Florence Price’s Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight and a performance of Verdi’s Requiem in partnership with Trinity Church, which included the premiere of a It’s a Journey by Tania León, commissioned by Dessoff to honor its centennial. Other past performances include Britten’s War Requiem and Mahler’s Symphony No.8 with Lorin Maazel in his final performances as Music Director with the New York Philharmonic. Over the course of its near-100-year history, Dessoff has presented many world premieres, including works by Virgil Thomson, George Perle, Paul Moravec, and Ricky Ian Gordon; the first American performance in nearly 100 years of Montemezzi’s opera La Nave with Teatro Grattacielo; and the American premieres of Philip Glass’s Symphony No.5 and John Tavener’s all-night vigil, The Veil of the Temple.

Dessoff's world-premiere recording of Margaret Bonds's Credo and Simon Bore the Cross was released in February 2023 and received rave reviews. WRTI wrote that “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...” We are also featured on a new album from Roomful of Teeth, Rough Magic, in a recently commissioned Eve Beglarian work, None More Than You.

Other recent discography includes Margaret Bonds: The Ballad of the Brown King & Selected Songs, a debut recording of Margaret Bonds’s crowning achievement, which was cited as a “Best Classical Recording of 2019” by WQXR-FM Radio; Reflections, featuring music by Convery, Corigliano, Moravec, and Rorem; and Glories on Glories, a collection of American song featuring composers from Billings to Ives.

The Dessoff Choirs is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council and by funds from the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of the Office of the Governor and the New York State Legislature.

Learn more at www.dessoff.org.

About Malcolm J. Merriweather
GRAMMY-nominated conductor Malcolm J. Merriweather is Director of the New York Philharmonic Chorus and Music Director of New York City’s The Dessoff Choirs and Orchestra. He is Professor and the Tania León Endowed Chair of Music at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

Renowned as an interpreter of symphonic choral masterworks, Merriweather has led major performances of Bach’s St. John Passion, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, and Handel’s Messiah, and is recognized internationally for his advocacy of Margaret Bonds, with world premiere recordings of The Ballad of the Brown King, Credo, and Simon Bore the Cross (AVIE Records). He has guest-conducted ensembles including the Choir of Trinity Wall Street, Novus Orchestra, and the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra.

The 2025–2026 season features four world premieres: David Lang’s The Wealth of Nations and Ellen Reid’s Earth Between Oceans with the New York Philharmonic Chorus, Mark Campbell and Peter Boyer’s A Hundred Years On with The Philadelphia Orchestra and The Crossing, and the title role in Frederick with Music Worcester. In celebration of his tenth season with The Dessoff Choirs, Merriweather conducts Howells’s Requiem, Hailstork’s The World Called, Bach’s Mass in B Minor with period orchestra, a reprise of Tania León’s It’s a journey, and appears twice with Andrea Bocelli at Madison Square Garden.

Recent highlights include opening the 2024–2025 season at Disney Concert Hall with music of Mary Lou Williams for Solange Knowles’s Glory to Glory: A Revival of Devotional Art; conducting Brahms’s Requiem at Town Hall for The Dessoff Choirs’ centennial with Will Liverman and Joélle Harvey; leading the Buffalo Philharmonic in Paul Moravec and Mark Campbell’s Sanctuary Road and Margaret Bonds’s Montgomery Variations; culminating the Dessoff centennial with Verdi’s Requiem at Trinity Church with Angela Meade, J’Nai Bridges, Won Whi Choi, and Kevin Short; and preparing the Caramoor Festival Chorus for Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony.

Other recent highlights include the world premiere of Handel: Made in America at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, staged performances of Craig Hella Johnson’s Considering Matthew Shepard with Trinity Wall Street, and preparing the New York Philharmonic Chorus for Jaap van Zweden in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony for the reopening of David Geffen Hall. In China, he prepared the Philharmonic Chorus for the world premiere of Émigré with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra.

Merriweather has also conducted at Jones Hall, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Disney Concert Hall, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Westminster Abbey, and the Vatican before Pope Francis. He served as founding Artistic Director of Voices of Haiti, a children’s choir established by the Andrea Bocelli Foundation in Port-au-Prince and was previously on the music staff at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.

Dr. Merriweather earned degrees from Eastman, Manhattan School of Music, and Syracuse University, and was a fellow at Tanglewood. Connect with him on social media @maestroweather and at malcolmjmerriweather.com.

Photo at top of release by Dan Wright

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