Virginia Film Festival

Charlottesville filmmaker Eduardo Montes-Bradley sits down with composer, conductor, and teacher of choral music, Alice Parker, in this intimate portrait of a true musical pioneer and her lasting impact on choral music and all the people who experience it. Parker shares stories of her remarkable 70-year career, clearly demonstrating her boundless passion for music, for life, and for kindness. First rising to prominence as a protégé of conductor Robert Shaw, for whom she worked as a researcher and arranger on numerous volumes of his compositions, Alice would expand her musical reach to include children’s music, church hymns, and songs sung in cathedrals and concert halls. Living, writing, and teaching in a small village in western Massachusetts, Alice Parker stands tall among her contemporaries as a true choral music pioneer and is widely celebrated for her convictions about the fundamental value of singing in all of our lives, and the unique capacity for choral singing to create social bonds that touch on the spiritual and afford intimations of the divine. Discussion with director Eduardo Montes-Bradley and subject Alice Parker, moderated by Michael Slon (UVA) to follow.