About the Chorale
The Sacred Music Chorale is a community choir composed of singers from all over Seattle and the Puget Sound region, representing many different beliefs, a broad selection of musical talents, and a diverse array of backgrounds.
What brings us together is an intense desire to join our voices together to sing the amazingly rich choral repertoire of the Christian Church.
Sacred Music Chorale Founding
Observing the current shift among many churches to more contemporary music, the six founding members gathered in the Fall of 1999 to discuss new ways of celebrating the great legacy of Christian music they had grown to love.
Out of this gathering was born the Sacred Music Chorale, an interdenominational community chorus based in the Puget Sound region, whose mission was to sing the great music of the Christian Church, and to give the gift of that music to our listeners.
To direct the newly-formed group, the founding members selected Brad Klostreich, who as interim director of University Presbyterian Church had led several of them in the past. Brad brought with him a great passion for and understanding of the music the group desired to sing, and proved to be the perfect match. Along with Brad, the group also selected Thelma Strand, a talented pianist and organist, to be the chorale’s accompanist.
Brad challenged the original six to double their number; they recruited even more—about two dozen singers—for the first rehearsal, January 9, 2000. The Chorale performed its first concert, with 28 members, in June 2000, in the Great Hall of Trinity Parish Episcopal Church in Seattle, where we continue to hold our rehearsals and remain artists-in-residence.
Since then, the group has generally presented concerts twice yearly, before Christmas and in the early Spring. The second season with 40 members. In the ensuing years our group has grown even larger, currently counting about 60 singers among our ranks.