Morten Lauridsen’s Residency with the Oregon Repertory Singers, Portland, OR, October 2018

In fall 2018 I had a sabbatical from teaching and my other regular duties at California Lutheran University. One purpose of a sabbatical is to enable a faculty member to engage deeply with a project he or she cares about; at the time I had already begun my book project on Morten Lauridsen’s music, and so I spent much of my time researching and writing. In October, I took a trip to Portland, Oregon to shadow the composer during his residency with the Oregon Repertory Singers. This was a very important residency, because the Oregon Repertory Singers was releasing a new CD, Shadows on the Stars: Music of Morten Lauridsen and Pacific Northwest Composers. The Portland area is also where the composer grew up. Prior to the first rehearsal, the composer and I drove to nearby Beaverton, his specific “hometown.” I saw the schools he had attended, the two neighborhoods where he lived, and his church, Bethel Congregational. After the trip to Beaverton, I met Dr. Ethan Sperry, who had studied under Lauridsen at the University of Southern California, and pianist and singer Naomi LaViolette.