Children's Festival Chorus Director Steps Down After 28 Years

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- The Children's Festival Chorus rehearses at the Hillman Center at Shady Side Academy in Fox Chapel.

Their Saturday afternoon concert will mark the end of their 30th season, and their conductor's final moments on the podium.

Christine Jordanoff and her chorus have made many stops in her 28 years as artistic director.

"To sing with the Pittsburgh Symphony at Heinz Hall, to sing with the Opera at the Benedum, to sing with the Mendelson at Carnegie Music Hall, we covered the entire gamut," she says. "So these were experiences that were not available to the every day school child."

Ranging in age from 8 to 15, the singers are also getting an education in music.

"It's not what a lot of people think is children's music," the director says. "They wear their Rudolph antlers at Christmas time and sing Deck the Halls and things like that. We sing music with real substance."

The music instructor from Duquesne University conducted the Triangle Chorus for US Steel for 10 years, prior to taking the helm of the Children's Festival Chorus in 1986. She will have directed some 2,200 young singers, when the last note is sounded Saturday afternoon. She says it's not just the music.

"We work with them at their most impressionable level, the formative stages of their lives, where we can open up their vistas," she said. "Then it's up to them to take it to the next level."

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