By the very definition of the term, virtually all musicians “play” music. A select number from within that group “make” music. An even smaller selection of that tiny ensemble “serve” music.
Alan Harler, retired artistic director and current conductor laureate of the Mendelssohn Chorus of Philadelphia, was one of those select few. He “served” the music he conducted. Harler passed away peacefully in his sleep Thursday, June 26. He is survived by Charles Kalick, his partner of 38 years.
Harler led the 151-year-old Mendelssohn Chorus from 1988 until 2015. When he began his tenure, the choir was undergoing serious challenges to its very existence. It was far from fiscally secure and, to a degree, had lost its motivational mission. The era of all-amateur, large choruses in America had pretty much come to an end. And the notion of focusing mostly on the choral music of its nominal inspiration — Felix Mendelssohn — had become less and less viable, what with an explosion of late-20th-century choral music.
He was so successful that by 2009, Harler inspired the chorus to create a professional board of directors and to support the creation of its first full-time executive director, with Harler serving as artistic director.
Once in place, Harler boldly took his 100-plus-member chorus into the world of contemporary music. The norm for choirs singing new music is best exemplified by The Crossing, the all-professional chamber choir founded and directed by Germantown’s Donald Nally. Large, mostly volunteer choruses (Mendelssohn Chorus has paid section leaders) often shy away from contemporary music, if only because of its difficulties of tonality and ensemble.
No matter how challenging the musical idiom of a commissioned new work, I never heard the Mendelssohn Chorus give anything less than a masterful rendition of any score in any concert I attended since he took over in 1988.
Harler never abandoned the standard repertoire. Serving both the legacies of Mendelssohn and his idol, Johann Sebastian Bach, Harler studied the former’s score of the latter’s immortal masterpiece, the “Saint Matthew Passion.”
It was Mendelssohn’s appointment as “kapellmeister” at St. Thomas Church in Leipzig, Germany, that sparked the first “Bach Revival” in the mid-19th century. Prior to that, JSB’s music had fallen into oblivion, even in the Lutheran Churches of Germany. Harler returned from Oxford University in England, where the manuscript was kept, with a reinvigorated commitment to the great masters and their music.
In his memory, the Mendelssohn Chorus has established the “Alan Harler New Ventures Fund” to honor his legacy by fostering contemporary music. The group also plans an event next season, according to DiOrio, to “celebrate his extraordinary life and to express our immense gratitude for his artistic spirit.”
I was already writing for the Chestnut Hill Local when Alan took over the artistic reins of the Mendelssohn Chorus in 1988. At the time, his predecessor had brought the ensemble close to collapse. There was real concern in the local choral music community that the Mendelssohn Chorus wouldn’t survive.
Not only did it survive but, under Harler’s tenure as artistic director, it rose to a level of national and international stature few of our local musical ensembles have ever achieved.
Harler’s successor, Dominick DiOrio, said, “In my current roles as artistic director of Mendelssohn Chorus of Philadelphia and director of Indiana University's NOTUS contemporary vocal ensemble (which Alan founded in 1980), I find myself awestruck by the incredible breadth and depth of his legacy. In no small way, my creative life today would not be possible without the pioneering efforts and noble vision of Alan Harler. He had a way of expecting excellence and inspiring ensembles with a limitless imagination, with an abundant kindness, and with a profound respect for the individual humanity of everyone.”
Harler’s career also included years of teaching choral conducting at Temple University’s Esther Boyer College of Music.
For me, Alan was a neverending wellspring of musical integrity and personal pleasure. His concerts were always a joy of enlightenment to hear, and getting together with him for a one-on-one encounter was an unaffected delight.
Dear Alan: “May the angels lead you into Paradise.”
You can contact NOYTEWORTHY at Michael-caruso@comcast.net
