Nordic Choir

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The Nordic Choir is a 70-voice a cappella choir of highly select mixed voices from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa.

In 1948, just two years after it’s founding by Dr. Sigvart Steen, a young Weston Noble began a 57-year tenure as music director and conductor. Together, Noble and the Nordic Choir cultivated one of the most honored choral traditions in the United States. Eventually six choirs were added to the music program to accommodate the growing interest in choral music and voice at Luther. In 2005, Luther College named Dr. Craig Arnold to the position of Director of Choral Activities and conductor of the Nordic Choir following Noble’s retirement.

The Nordic Choir tours annually throughout the United States and has appeared at many of the major concert halls and music centers in America, including Lincoln Center, New York City; the Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C.; Orchestra Hall, Chicago; Orchestra Hall and the Historic State Theatre, Minneapolis; the Ordway Music Theatre, St. Paul, Minn.; Walt Disney Concert Hall, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and the Crystal Cathedral, Los Angeles; and the historic Mormon Tabernacle, Salt Lake City.

The choir has also been featured in three international television broadcasts of The Hour of Power and on four national convention programs of the American Choral Directors Association.

Every fourth year the choir tours internationally. The Nordic Choir has made numerous concert tours of Europe, the Caribbean, Mexico, Russia, and Eastern Europe. During its 1994 tour of Russia and Eastern Europe, the Nordic Choir performed in Tchaikovsky Hall, Moscow, and the Franz Liszt Academy, Budapest, and shared a concert in St. Petersburg’s Philharmonic Hall with the St. Petersburg Conservatory Choir. The Nordic Choir returned to Russia and Eastern Europe in 1997 on a tour that included performances with the Moscow Chamber Orchestra. In 2000 and 2003, the choir honored the college’s roots with tours to Norway and Scandinavia. In 2006, the Nordic Choir toured Europe with concerts in Italy, Austria, Germany and the Czech Republic.

Closer to home, the choir appears frequently on campus in concerts, worship services and at Christmas at Luther, the college's annual Christmas concerts, alongside the Luther College Symphony Orchestra and the other Luther choirs.

In the fall of 2006, The Nordic Choir released its first CD under the direction of Dr. Craig Arnold, The Road Home, that joined the extensive library of recordings highlighting the Noble choral legacy. The choir's most recent release, "Everlasting God", was released in January 2008.

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