Anna Crusis Womens Choir

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About Anna CrusisThe Anna Crusis Women's Choir, founded in 1975, is the country's oldest feminist choir and has been honored for its community service in the Philadelphia area. The Choir acts as both an agent of social change and a premier performing arts group by empowering its audiences on important issues of the day affecting women, youth and disadvantaged populations. Anna is a 501 ( c ) organization committed to reaching diverse audiences including people and communities that have little access to the arts. Anna has performed for Project Home, Habitat for Humanity, Congreso de Latinos Unidos, the Maternity Care Coalition, the Support Center for Child Advocates and many AIDS awareness groups. It also supports the work of other progressive social justice organizations by singing at benefits and fundraisers. In addition to its outreach performances, Anna Crusis performs three public concerts each year. The Anna Crusis Women's Choir is a feminist choir striving for musical excellence and social change, with a special focus on music by, for and about women and their lives. The choir values and seeks diversity and inclusion in its membership, audiences and musical selection. While honoring their common ground, members also work to respect and learn from their differences in sexual orientation, racial and cultural heritage, age, class, and spiritual expression. The choir supports, empowers and uplifts its audiences and its members in their struggle for justice, peace and equality. The Anna Crusis Women's Choir was founded by Cathy Roma in the fall of 1975, and it is the nation's longest-running feminist choir. The ensemble, the longest-running feminist choir in the nation, acts both as an agent of social change and a premier performing arts group. For the first few years, the choir's main musical selection was a compilation of music entitled "American Women: A Choral Herstory, " but as time went on, both the repertoire and the audience of the choir broadened. Cathy Roma nurtured and conducted the choir for eight years before moving on to new challenges. ( In Cincinatti, she founded Muse, another excellent feminist choir. ) With Cathy's departure, the choir faced a critical turning point, dwindling down to a hopeful few who were convinced that, despite obstacles, the ideas and spirit of Anna Crusis were worth pursuing. These women pulled together a search committee and in January of 1984 selected Jane Hulting as the choir's new musical director. Jane continued in this position for eighteen years, drawing on the members' individual and collective talents as we continually move towards new understandings of what the choir can be. During the Spring of 2002, former Anna singer, Jackie Coren, and current Anna singer, Heather Russell, conducted, nudged, and inspired the choir through a wonderful season. Since that time, Jacquline Coren has been our fearless artistic director, leading us in our music and our mission. The choir's unusual name has its origins in the Greek word "anacrusis, " a word used in music to describe an "upbeat" or "feminine" entrance to a phrase. Physically, it may be described as the precise moment of anticipation and exhilaration which occurs as a singer takes a quick, deep breath before vocalizing. The choir finds the phrase fitting for the purpose of defining ourselves in relation to music, a philosophy of feminism, and the joy of performing. The choir performs music from classical and renaissance traditions as well as music which is experimental in nature. We have sung in pop, jazz, reggae, folk, gospel, Balkan, and country styles, and in many different languages. We sing songs from all over the world as well as works by local composers, in addition to commissioned works.