On Sunday, December 8, during 10:15a.m. worship, the Sanctuary Choir will be presenting Antonio Vivaldi’s Gloria, RV 589, for Special Music Sunday! The work will feature three vocal soloists, UCCIC Children’s Choir Director and soprano, Avery Nabholz, Sanctuary Choir member and soprano, Marie VonBehren, and University of Iowa DMA student and Alto, Kelly Hill.

Antonio Vivaldi composed this Gloria in Venice, probably in 1715, for the choir of the Ospedale della Pietà, an orphanage for girls (or more probably a home, generously endowed by the girls' "anonymous" fathers, for the illegitimate daughters of Venetian noblemen and their mistresses). The Ospedale prided itself on the quality of its musical education and the excellence of its choir and orchestra. Vivaldi, a priest, music teacher and virtuoso violinist, composed many sacred works for the Ospedale, where he spent most of his career, as well as hundreds of instrumental concertos to be played by the girls’ orchestra. This, his most famous choral piece, presents the traditional Gloria from the Latin Mass in twelve varied cantata-like sections.