Tulsa Chorale is eager to introduce you to the three soloists who will be featured alongside the chorus in our November 23 performance of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Christmas cantata, “Hodie.”
Dr. David Howard, bass, is Associate Director of Choral Activities at the University of Oklahoma where he conducts the OU Men’s Glee Club, OU Women’s Chorus, and Opera Chorus. He teaches graduate and undergraduate choral conducting and also coordinates the annual Young Men’s Vocal Workshop and Women’s Choral Leadership Workshop. His collegiate choirs, civic choruses, opera choruses, church choirs, and secondary school choirs in Texas, Oklahoma, and Michigan have been hailed for their beauty of tone, musicality, and clarity of diction. The OU Women’s Chorus performed by invitation at the Oklahoma Music Educators Association annual conference in 2018.
Equally at home as a baritone soloist, Dr. Howard maintains a performance schedule in oratorio and cantata presentations, and as a recitalist. His repertoire ranges from the music of J.S. Bach to contemporary works. Recent performances include recitals of Schubert’s Winterreise and Schumann’s Dichterliebe and Liederkreis, the bass solos in Mozart’s Krönungsmesse, K. 317 with the Filharmonia Gorzowska at the Szczecin [Poland] International Choral Festival. Dr. Howard’s recently-released album of sacred music for voice, piano, and harp, entitled Consecration, on the Blue Griffin Records label, is available for purchase through iTunes, Amazon, and Google Play.
His scholarly articles have appeared in the British academic music journal, Musical Times, and in The Choral Journal. Moreover, his performing editions and choral arrangements are published by Alliance Music Publications.
As a lover of performing, Dr. Eiler is a passionate supporter of classical performing arts and an active performer in the genres of art song, opera, oratorio, contemporary crossover repertoire, and concerto works for both the voice and piano. Favorite opera roles include Donna Anna (Don Giovanni) and Alice Ford (Falstaff). A two-time OU Concerto Competition winner, Dr. Eiler was featured as a pianist performing Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini and as a singer performing selections from Canteloube’s Chants d’Auvergne. She has also performed with regional orchestras as a soprano soloist in Orff’s Carmina Burana. In 2016 Dr. Eiler made her Tulsa Oratorio Chorus debut with Haydn’s Mass in a Time of War and Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony Chorale. Dr. Eiler is a founding member of the Tulsa-based Divine Divas Trio and faculty member of Oral Roberts University Music Department.
Michelle Eiler lives in Tulsa with her husband Steven Eiler and her two children, Charlotte and Felix. Dr. Kim Childs, tenor, sings regularly in recital and concert venues. He has performed with the Denton Bach Choir in the role of Evangelist in the J. S. Bach St. Matthew Passion. Other performances have included the Saint-Saëns Messe De Requiem, Op. 54 and J. S. Bach’s Mass in B minor, both with the Tulsa Oratorio Chorus (now Tulsa Chorale), and he has also sung with the University of North Texas Symphony Orchestra and Grand Chorus in Mozart’s Requiem. With the Oklahoma State University, he was soloist in J. S. Bach’s Herr, gehe nicht ins Gericht mit deinem Knecht from Cantata BWV 105. Other concerts have included his Tulsa Opera debut in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, Haydn’s Missa in Angustiis with the Tulsa Oratorio Chorus, Handel’s Acis and Galatea (Acis) and Semele (Jupiter) with the Staunton Music Festival in Staunton, Virginia, and J. S. Bach’s St. Matthew Passion with the Dallas Bach Society in Dallas, Texas. He sings frequently in the Concerts with Commentary series at the University of Tulsa; most recently, Vaughan Williams’ Ten Blake Songs and On Wenlock Edge. He has sung with a number of professional choirs, including the American Bach Soloists, Orpheus Chamber Singers, Carmel Bach Festival, Texas Choral Artists, Dallas Bach Society, the Westminster Chamber Choir in Florence, Italy, and previous seasons of the Santa Fe Desert Chorale. Dr. Childs is Professor of Choral Studies and Voice at the University of Tulsa.
