Chanticleer

Based in San Francisco, California, Chanticleer is a full-time classical vocal ensemble in the United States. For three decades, Chanticleer has developed a grand reputation for its interpretation of Renaissance music, but performs a wide repertoire of jazz, gospel, and other venturesome new music and is widely known as an "Orchestra of Voices". It was named for the "clear singing rooster" in Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales.

Chanticleer was founded in 1978 by tenor Louis Botto who sang with the group until 1989, and served as Artistic Director until his death in 1997. As a graduate student of musicology, Botto found that much of the medieval and Renaissance music he was studying was not being performed, and, because of this, he formed the group to perform this music with an all male ensemble, as it was traditionally sung during the Renaissance period.

Originally, the group contained ten singers, but has varied anywhere from eight to twelve. Currently, Chanticleer contains twelve men including two basses, one baritone, three tenors, and six countertenors (three altos and three sopranos).

In 2000, Joseph Jennings (Artistic Director) and Chanticleer won a Grammy Award for Best Small Ensemble Performance for their work Colors of Love — Works of Thomas, Stucky, Tavener and Rands.

In May 2007, Chanticleer released "And On Earth, Peace: A Chanticleer Mass" (Warner Classics) a new mass written by five contemporary composers. Israeli-born composer Shulamit Ran wrote the Credo to the Hebrew text "Ani Ma'amin; US composer Douglas Cuomo contributed the Kyrie; Turkish-American composer Kamran Ince composed the Gloria section to a sufi text; English composer Ivan Moody composed the Sanctus; and Irish composer Michael McGlynn (director of Anúna) composed the Agnus Dei. The Mass was premiered in performance at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and will be followed by six performances throughout the Bay Area. The New York Times has more on the repertoire here:

On October 16, 2007, Chanticleer released "Let it Snow," the group's 29th recording. A portion of the album is accompanied by orchestra and/or big band; as such, the album brings a new sound to Chanticleer's almost exclusively a cappella repertoire. The Chanticleer website has more information, including a listing of tracks, here:

In November 2007, whilst in its 30th Anniversary Season, Chanticleer was named Musical America's 2008 Ensemble of the year. This marks the first time a vocal ensemble has received this award. Additionally, on October 9, 2008, Chanticleer became the first vocal ensemble to be inducted into the American Classical Music Hall of Fame in Cincinnati, Ohio.