56 Seasons and Four Choirs Strong
Durango Choral Society Mixed Choir
Durango Women's Choir
Durango Children's Chorale
Durango Youth Chorus
Our Mission: "To enhance the vocal, musical and cultural development of Southwest Colorado through the promotion of and/or participation by the Choral Society and its members in musical programs for the benefit and enjoyment of the community. Emphasis shall be placed on providing educational opportunities for both singing participants and audience members."
Singing elevates our lives and fills our paths with joy and higher purpose. Help us live our mission of accessibility to the choral arts through world-class performances, low ticket prices, and scholarships. Research shows that singing improves our physical, mental, and emotional health at all ages. The same is true for choral audiences. Youth involved in choral programs are four times more likely to become involved in their communities and philanthropies as adults. Your partnership enhances lives and our communities. In concert with you, we keep the arts vibrant and improve the quality of life for singers and audiences alike.
Our singers and our audience members range in age from 6 to 96, a very rare and special cross- generational demographic! We are proud of this fact and point to our choral family's impressive age range as a testimonial to wide impact in and of itself. Choral music has a deep and lasting impact and simply makes life better. A few years back we sang at the memorial service of a dearly departed 101 year old dedicated patron (Mae Forleo) whose family told us that she said attending our concerts was a true joy and that our music greatly enhanced the quality of her later life.
Music making and singing in particular are very emotional at heart. Singers and audience members are deeply touched by live performance. It is not uncommon to see and hear audience members exclaiming in glee or amazement or weeping joyful or cathartic tears, having been touched on a level that only music can reach. Though the choristers cannot display these feelings and emotions as openly as the audience, we can assure you that the magic of the moments impact us deeply and raise our artistry to an even higher level. They flow through us, and as they do, we get to observe the immediate impact that our art is having on our patrons through a most beautiful, transactional, living relationship between artist and audience.
Thank you for helping keep the choral arts alive and accessible to all! We sing for you.
The mission of the Durango Choral Society is to enhance the musical and cultural development of our community through the promotion of choral activities and concerts for the enjoyment of the public. Emphasis is placed on providing educational opportunities for both singers and audience members.
The Durango Choral Society (DCS) is currently in its 56th season. DCS has grown from a small group of adult singers who met for enjoyment in 1970, to an organization that has four performing choirs: the 100-voice adult mixed choir; the 16 treble voices of the Durango Women's Choir (DWC); the 48 young voices of the Durango Children's Chorale(DCC); and the 22 voices Durango Youth Chorus (DYC), serving middle school aged singers. We are proud that we now have a choir for singers of every age! DCS primarily serves La Plata County, although some of our singers and audience members come from the neighboring counties of Archuleta, Montezuma and San Juan, as well as from Northern New Mexico. The repertoire is drawn from many languages and cultures, and both the singers and the audience represent a cross section of our community. We are very committed to the opportunities the DCS provides for the youth of La Plata County. We are also committed to offering our community exemplary and diverse concerts of the highest quality. Our collaborative efforts expand each year and include works with the San Juan Symphony, Fort Lewis College Choirs, The Telluride Renaissance Singers, the Music in the Mountains Orchestra, the Santa Fe Women's Choir, and numerous instrumentalists from the Four Corners area. In addition to a delivering a world-class presentation of challenging major works in five magnificent Durango performance venues, we go on tour and our community partnerships travel with us. Though travel and collaboration we gain new understandings of various cultural and choral traditions as well as increase our visibility. Over time we have expanded our performance venues and accepted invitations to represent Colorado twice at Carnegie Hall, across Central Europe, and in Syros, Greece at the International Festival of the Aegean. The has DCS traveled to the Varna International Choral festival as performing guests in Croatia, Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Salzburg. The DCS participated in a choral festival in Oahu, Hawaii (April, 2017) the DCC performed at Carnegie Hall (May 2017) and the DCS in June 2018) The DCS has again been invited to perform at Carnegie Hall (June 2027) with our own artistic director Rhonda Muckerman conducting. Most recently, DCS performed in Florence, Italy (June 2025). We feel that we are living up to the Colorado Creative Industries statewide objective of ensuring that "Colorado will be recognized as a premier creative hub-a home for world-class creative businesses, productions and experiences." We are proud to be dedicated Durango artists as well as ambassadors of Colorado on the international stage. We hope to proudly forefront your organization as an important, visible partner, both locally and on the stages of the world.
Organization name
Durango Choral Society
other names
DCS
1984
Tax id (EIN)
74-2290319
Category
Arts, Culture & Humanities
Organization Size
Small Organization
Address
910 E 3rd AveHeadquarters
910 E 3rd AveMailing
PO 1043La Plata County, CO, US