A special announcement from Masterworks Chorale: After half a century of bringing great choral music to Metro-East, and a highly successful 50th Anniversary Jubilee Season, Masterworks is concluding its artistic service to Southern Illinois. We are deeply grateful to our benefactors, sponsors, and supporting institutions, our devoted audiences, and most of all, to our dedicated directors and performers. It has been a joy and a privilege to share the beauty of choral singing with all of you. With immense gratitude, we acknowledge our devoted members and our many enthusiastic supporters. We thank those community institutions which have offered support and assistance, especially St. Paul United Church of Christ, Belleville; St. Clare of Assisi Catholic Church, O’Fallon; and the Cathedral of St. Peter, Belleville; Southwestern Illinois College; and the Hettenhausen Center for the Arts at McKendree University. We are especially grateful to the Chorale’s two primary conductors for their inspired leadership and musicianship in that 50-year span: Dr. A. Dennis Sparger, founder and director emeritus of Masterworks; and our current conductor for the past fifteen seasons, Dr. Stephen Mager. We also thank the many excellent professional guest soloists and musicians who have performed with us over the years. We proudly acknowledge our major national and state supporters, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the Illinois Arts Council Agency; and we thank our generous local sponsors and donors for their unwavering support, especially the Art on the Square and the Belleville News Democrat. Finally, we thank our loyal audiences for their support, their applause, and their friendship, which we readily accepted. It’s been a great fifty years! (fb)

On behalf of Masterworks Artistic Director Dr. Stephen Mager, we would like to invite you to the closing concert of this year's Masterworks Summer Youth Camp on Friday, July 12 at 12:15 pm, at St. Paul UCC (115 W. B Street, Belleville, IL 62220). It will feature music that our 21 students learned this week, including selections from the Celtic nations, and from Rodgers and Hammerstein's “The King and I.” The concert is free and it should conclude by 1 pm. If you're able, please come and support the next generation of Masterworks singers! You can also help spread the word by sharing this post with your family, friends and other music lovers that you know. Thanks, and we hope to see you there this Friday! (fb)