About
Who we are
The UCLA Choral Program is made up of music majors and non-music majors, representing all walks of UCLA campus life, ranging from engineering, sociology, and math, to theater, law, English, and more. Singers are selected on vocal and musical ability alone and therefore include Freshman through Doctoral students, working side-by-side with the common goal of musical and vocal excellence. The UCLA Chorale and University Chorus each rehearse four and a half hours per week, maintaining the highest level of professional performance discipline, mental focus, and artistic musicality and expression. The UCLA Chamber Singers, chosen from the ranks of the UCLA Chorale, rehearse two hours a week and perform a diverse repertoire of music from the Renaissance to the present.
Our philosophy
UCLA choral singers consistently mention that the depth of feeling developed through this level of singing actually carries over into the inner feelings they now experience in their everyday non-musical life – with friends, family, nature, and other personal situations. This is the very reason for, and purpose of the Arts – to learn to experience, express, and freely communicate the full range of human emotion in a totally uninhibited manner. In so doing, we can all more fully develop the human spirit.
Our impact
“The choir sang with remarkable agility and brightness…A performance of sculpted shapes and springing rhythms…Neuen is an exacting conductor whose approach works well with the chorus, and the orchestra played expertly…The performance was stirring…impressively loud and impressively soft.”
- Los Angeles Times
“I’ve been attending ACDA conventions for 25 years. The UCLA Chorale is the finest choir I’ve ever heard – and that’s in comparison with the Robert Shaw Singers, the L.A. Master Chorale, and other professional and university choruses from around the world.”
- John Clark, Music Dept. Chair, University of New Mexico