Saturday, December 6, 2025 at Holy Cross Lutheran Church

The entire place was full of holiday cheer as we presented a program packed with festive songs to a standing room-only crowd.

Thursday, October 30, 2025 was a SPOOKY day of singing! We had a great time celebrating the season: anyone who came dressed either for Halloween or for autumn was entered in the drawing for the door prize. Janet Rodekohr was the lucky winner of four really cute Halloween-themed dessert plates.

Thursday, August 28, 2025 at Holy Cross Lutheran Church. We had a great time catching up with each other and getting know new friends, too. Some women came to pay their dues and pick up their music but couldn’t stay for the potluck. Also, at one point I had to put down my phone and actually talk to people, so I did not get photos of everyone. We officially have 40 women singing this fall–it’s going to be a wonderful year!

 

Sunday, July 27, 2025 at Macedonia Baptist Church: They were having a special service that Sunday to celebrate women and invited us to sing as their special guests. It was an amazing experience and great honor for Meridian! We sang “Be the Light” by Franklin Willis; “Servant Song” by Donna Marie McCargill; and “His Eye is on the Sparrow” by Charles H. Gabriel. Ellen Ritchey, Cass Robinson, and Peggye Thornburg each sang a solo verse on “Sparrow” and it was beautiful. Ellen Ritchey played keyboard for all three songs as well.

Thursday, May 15, 2025 at Holy Cross Lutheran Church: Great friends, great food, and talk about the great fun coming up in our 2025-2026 season!

Thursday, May 8, 2025 at St. Philothea Greek Orthodox Church: we sang for our supper at the best spaghetti dinner in town!

Sunday, April 27, 2025 at Trinity Lutheran Church

Photos by Tony Yu

Saturday, March 22, 2025

Thursday, January 9, 2025

We had over thirty members show up over the course of the luncheon and everyone had a great time catching up with old friends and making new friends, too! We are so grateful to Holy Cross Lutheran Church for giving us the use of their wonderful Fellowship Hall.

Saturday, December 7, 2024

We had an SRO crowd for our holiday concert–it was so much fun and the music was all so good! Here are a few photos. TY = photo by Tony Yu

Thursday, October 31, 2024

What a GREAT rehearsal! And we had so much fun sharing our Halloween- and Autumn-themed garb! Soprano Ellen Surrency won the door prize: a pair of Halloween socks and a lovely ceramic pumpkin, a perfect piece of home decor for the entire fall season!

Sunday, October 20, 2024

We performed “The Four Seasons of Praise”, a choral song cycle based on four Shaker hymns, each celebrating a different season.

To listen to our performance, click here: https://youtu.be/M0LMNX8yzpE?si=80-fgjn0DgB-UvUK

Thursday, June 13, 2024

We ate some great food, got some business done, and got to catch up a little bit. Next potluck: August 29th.

Saturday, June 1, 2024

Several Meridian women, past and present, performed the Mozart Requiem with the Athens Master Chorale and Friends at Carnegie Hall. It was an outstanding and historical performance: Athens Master Chorale founder Joseph Napoli ended his conducting career with a bang, going out on a high note at Carnegie Hall (only fitting, since his career had started In New York City at the Metropolitan Opera!)

Thursday, May 9, 2024

What a treat! We got to sing eight of our favorites from the April 28th concert one more time, to an appreciative audience. We were all treated to a delicious spaghetti dinner afterwards, and invited to come back again next year.

Sunday, April 28, 2024

An amazing concert full of fun and great music, performed to a SRO crowd at St. Gregory the Great Episcopal Church. If anyone has any photos from the day, please send them to me (I was busy directing and couldn’t take any).

Friday, March 22, 2024

What a great evening! We sang four of our family-friendly favorites from our upcoming concert, plus we got to spend time seeing other performers and art displays as well.

Sunday, March 10, 2024

We had a wonderful time singing with the Classic City Band for their Spring Concert at Hodgson Hall. We sang Julie Giroux’s “My Soul to Keep”, a touching piece meant to bring solace to those affected by gun violence.

Thursday, January 4, 2024

A bunch of us got together for a luncheon to celebrate the New Year. Members got to pay their semester dues and pick up their music BEFORE the first rehearsal…and enjoy catching up with each other, too! We had a great time and welcomed some new members to the chorus.

Saturday, December 9, 2023

A group of Meridian women and friends gathered to sing for the Georgia Museum of Art’s annual Family Fun Day. We sang everything from traditional carols to Hanukkah and Kwanzaa songs, finishing with “Auld Lang Syne” and “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”.

Thursday, December 7, 2023

Our audience was so generous in giving to Meridian at our Tapestry Concert!  In gratitude for the many ways the people of Holy Cross support us and our mission to bring fine choral music to the greater Athens area, before the concert we had pledged to give 20% of the donations received that day to Holy Cross.  We were so pleased to be able to present a $400 check to Holy Cross to Reverend Hilkert.  Thank you so much to everyone who made it possible!

Saturday, December 2, 2023

Holy Cross Lutheran Church

We had such a great concert! The place was packed and full of revelry. Here are some photos from our wonderful afternoon of music:

During rehearsal, Thursday, October 26, 2023

Today we celebrated Autumn and Halloween with some fun: anyone who dressed up either for Halloween or in an Autumn theme would be entered in the door prize drawing. Marjanne Goozé was the lucky winner of a lovely pot of mums from Cofer’s.

Sunday, October 22, 2023 at Trinity Lutheran Church

Today we performed the Shaker song “Gladsome Sound” and Marta Keen’s “Homeward Bound” for the Americana concert held in conjunction with the presentation of the church’s quilt group’s output for the year. The quilts will all go to people who could use a hug and a warm quilt.

Tuesday, October 10, 2023  at the Athens Area Humane Society

Our April 28th concert will have a wonderful theme:  Animals!  And we are teaming up with the Athens Area Humane Society to raise awareness for them during the spring.  As part of our partnership we will also support them in some caroling events this holiday season.

Today some of the ladies met at the Humane Society facility for caroling practice with musician Kelsey Fredriksen (she is also their marketing director).  We got to sing through some beloved carols and then explore the facility a bit.  It was a fun morning…but those cats and dogs were so darn cute!  It was really hard to leave them there!  Hopefully they will all be going to good, loving homes very soon.

Sunday, May 28, 2023 4 pm at the Performing Arts Center at Jefferson High School

This afternoon a group from Meridian Women’s Chorus sang at the Classic City Band’s Memorial Day Weekend Concert. It was a wonderful concert and we were so glad for the opportunity to contribute. Many thanks to Director Michael Brewer for the kind invitation!

Special thanks go to…Altos: Lorraine Downie; Janet Rodekohr; Angela Helwig; Susan Garrett; Linda Tiller; Barbara Rodgers; Betsy Vonk; Jennifer Saye; and Gabrielle Mason…

…and Sopranos: Cass Robinson; Ellen Ritchey; Nova Todd; Kathy Carter; Peggye Thornburg; Denise Gabriel; Cindy Vail; Wendy Arthur; and Pauline Rakich.

We also thank soprano Terri Tillman for joining us for the event (Michael Brewer is her husband so she was very glad to sing).

Note: I apologize to anyone who didn’t make it into a photo; the lighting was very bad for photography so many photos went to the trash despite attempts to fix them. If you have any photos to add, please send them to meridianathensga@gmail.com

Sunday, April 30, 2023 4 pm at Friendship Presbyterian Church

We had such a great concert–the room was SRO and we all had a wonderful time!

Spring 2023

In honor of Roger Vogel’s The Nature of the Cat, we present Meridian Cats…

Soprano and Alto Sectionals, March 20th and 21st, 2023

WOW!  We were so lucky to have composer visits TWO WEEKS IN A ROW! 

On February 23rd composer Sally Coenen came to our rehearsal to talk about the piece she arranged for us, “A Thousand Thanks”.  This piece was originally written for solo soprano and piano; this past fall Stacie and Sally talked about how the text would be so perfect for a piece for women’s chorus…and Sally arranged it as a gift to us!  A thousand thanks go out to Sally…we’re really looking forward to singing it in our spring concert on April 30th.

On March 2nd we welcomed composer Roger Vogel to our rehearsal. Roger has given us the use of his song cycle The Nature of the Cat for our upcoming spring concert. We were very interested to hear about his process for researching and writing, and also about his experiences playing harmonica as well. In addition, he talked about the changes in technology over the years, and showing us the kinds of calligraphy pens he worked with back in the 70s and 80s. It was a great visit, and we are working hard to do his wonderful, comical piece justice!

We had a great lunch together, watched the movie Florence Foster Jenkins, and picked up music in advance of next week’s rehearsal–what a great afternoon!

Many thanks to Whit Richardson and Taziki’s Cafe for donating Mediterranean Salad and fixings for all of us–YUM!