Singing for Their Supper

"It’s been a quick and a long two years,” says Matthew Culloton, artistic director of The Singers–Minnesota Choral Artists, of building the new choir from the ashes of the Dale Warland Singers. He’d sung with Warland for five years and, in the last year, been his music adviser, so it was only natural that when Warland announced his retirement, members turned to Culloton. “Half the choir came asking what I was going to do,” he says, “and I said to myself, ‘This is what I’ve always wanted to do when I grow up . . . .’”

The choir starts its third season with a growing reputation and balance sheet. Last year, the average attendance was 650 per concert series, up from around 300 the previous year. This year, the season is expanding from three concert series to six, and the ensemble is joining the ranks of professional choirs.

Culloton’s upbringing, though, didn’t prepare him for any of this. “Nobody in my family was musical,” he says. Still, both Culloton and his identical twin brother have made careers of choral conducting. (Michael is the director of the Choral Arts Ensemble of Rochester.) Of his relationship with Michael, Culloton says, “There is not a competitive bone in our bodies. We collect music and exchange it—like baseball cards.”

Concordia College, Culloton worked as a music teacher in Long Prairie. A year later, he joined Warland—which meant a four-hour roundtrip drive to Minneapolis every Monday and Thursday to rehearse. “Tuesday and Friday mornings came awfully early that year,” he says. The following year, he became the choral conductor at Hopkins High School, which eased the commute.

Culloton admits that The Singers have struggled to be seen as more than a clone of the Dale Warland Singers. “Initially, we sounded just like Warland,” he says, which wasn’t surprising given that thirty-two of The Singers’ forty members were Warland alums. This season, twenty of the forty members sang for Warland. “We’re finding new blood and new energy,” Culloton says.

And they’re finding a new sound. “I want a wider palette than Dale used,” says Culloton. “I don’t want to get stuck in ‘The Singers’ sound,’ but to be known for ‘The Singers’ sounds.’” Culloton is also broadening the repertory beyond Warland’s focus on new music, as listeners will discover at The Singers’ upcoming concert, “Music of the British Isles.” Benjamin Britten’s landmark “Hymn to St. Cecilia” anchors the program, which also features Victorian part songs and traditional English folk songs in arrangements by Ralph Vaughan Williams and Gustav Holst.

Last spring, Culloton took an academic leave from Hopkins High School to pursue a master’s degree in choral conducting at the University of Minnesota and to devote more time to The Singers. His dream is to build the chorus into a full-time professional choir, the first in the country. (He doesn’t count Chanticleer, Cantus, or other groups, because they’re all much smaller ensembles.) “If it can happen anywhere, it’ll happen here, in the heart of choral country,” Culloton says. “The sky’s the limit here—and I don’t take that for granted for a second.”

Oct. 14. St. Paul’s Church on the Hill, 1524 Summit Ave., St. Paul; Oct. 15. St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral, 519 Oak Grove St., Mpls., 651-209-6689, singersmca.org