Tag Archives: Adelfos

Temmo Korisheli – DirecTalk interview (audio) 5-20-15

Adelfos 1

This week on THE CLASSICAL NOW, my interview with TEMMO KORISHELI, director of Adelfos Ensemble. For eleven years the a cappella vocal ensemble Adelfos has grown and evolved from its beginnings as a men’s-night-out group, equal parts camaraderie and art (self-described “drinking group with a singing problem”), to its current splendor as a mixed ensemble consisting of some of the finest and most experienced singers in Santa Barbara. Korisheli, an early music scholar and cataloguer at the UCSB Arts Library, began directing Adelfos in 2008, and changed the group forever in two key ways: thematic programming, and in 2010, adding women’s voices. I sat down with Temmo for a wonderful hour at UCSB in anticipation of Adelfos’s performances next weekend: “All Angels Cry Aloud: Music for the English Church,” a program of Anglican cathedral music featuring the recently-appointed organist of Trinity Episcopal Church, Dr. Thomas Joyce.  Visit Adelfos on Facebook for more information.

Adelfos Ensemble, Tuesday June 10

A Tall Ship and a Star to Steer By

Adelfos Ensemble in concert at Trinity Episcopal Church on Tuesday, June 10, 2014

Most classical music groups have adjourned by late spring. After a flush of season finales in May, there suddenly falls a lull for music lovers, doldrums really. But recent years have witnessed one notable ship tacking to a different trade wind. I’m talking about that eighteen-voice wonder known as Adelfos Ensemble, directed for the past six years by early music expert and brilliant tenor, Temmo Korisheli. Last June Adelfos sang an exciting program of early American music, diverse in content, dense in substance, bright in execution, educational, ever surprising, and totally original. And this year’s June bloom went even further, with a fascinating program entitled, “Over the Stormy Ocean Tossed: Choral Songs of Seafaring, Adventuring, and Calamities.” What makes Adelfos so outstanding is partly the high skill set and musical maturity of its singers, many of whom are soloists and section leaders with other groups in town. They pull-off the harmonic heavy-lifting of tight intervals and funky key shifts with seeming intuitive ease. But the group also owes much to Korisheli’s bold thematic programming, scholarly breadth, and leadership skills that guide singers to master some very tough music. If there is one disappointment about Adelfos, it is only that they do not yet share more broadly what they so painstakingly prepare, season after season. Continue reading →