'Lift the entire community': Alberta Vocal Arts is a new non-profit giving classical singers a venue for their voice

Alberta Vocal Arts' mission is to promote and celebrate the classical vocal arts in the province, including opera, operetta, art song or German lieder.

Kathleen Morrison, a performer and artistic and executive director of the organization, says it promotes anything to do with the classical voice.

"It struck me that having (performances) on the smaller scale with really high quality singers was something that was brand new," she said.

"What we're aiming to do is to do more of the classical arts and the classical vocal arts, but bringing it more directly to the people."

Morrison says Calgary has a vibrant arts scene that is supported by municipal and provincial levels of government along with Calgarians and is looking forward to hosting performances in a smaller venue.

"It makes it less intimidating, you're seeing us closer up, there's not that much of a distance between us and it's more of an intimate setting," said Morrison.

"For us here in Calgary, yes, we have the big dogs in town, we have Calgary Opera, we have these big performing arts organizations, but what we're trying to do is to take some of those singers, those mid-level singers and performers, and bring them directly to the people."

Morrison says she's been living off her voice professionally for over 20 years, performing across the country and around the world. She knows there are many extremely talented artists living in Calgary and the rest of the country and she reached out to many of them with her idea.

"When I brought my idea to some of these singers to say ‘I have this crazy idea of starting this this non-profit, to bring these beautiful stories and these beautiful voices and these beautiful engaging evenings to the people of Calgary and to the people of Alberta,’ and I think a lot of them said ‘okay, if Kathleen's in, then I'm in, let's give it a shot,’" she said.

Morrison has partnered with the Rocky Mountain Symphony to perform out of its Polaris Centre for the Performing Arts in northeast Calgary and its 250 seat venue.

Carlos Foggin is the founder who is also a classically trained pianist and accompanies Morrison.

"We put the best of everything in here," he said. "People are just surprised when they come out saying it's just as good if not better than what they see downtown because you've got the sound quality, the audio quality, the lighting, the projection, but you can see the stage."

Foggin says those attending a performance are no more than 20 metres from the stage, so they can see every expression and vocal artists don't have to project as much as they would in a larger venue.

"Taking it to smaller venues, more accessible spaces, maybe less traditional spaces where people don't feel the need to dress up and they come as they are, is kind of the idea of these new, smaller companies," he said. "It's creating great new audiences that can start to consume more because the first bite was easy."

Foggin says Alberta Vocal Arts is also a great space for artists to sing in front of a live audience.

"Having the option to sing on stage is rare, especially in stage production," said Foggin. "A lot of our singers sing auditorio or church work, but to have singers coming in from all over the country to work in staged work is a treat."

Morrison says her goal with this project is to create opportunities for mid-level performing artist.

"These are singers that have had some successes on the international stage, they've done smaller roles with the bigger companies around Canada and around the world and they just haven't hit that superstar status yet," she said.

"There's some instances where you're going to see really beautiful singers that are just about to crack into that 'A' level and a lot of other singers that are just working singers, this is our job, this is what we do."

Morrison says it's important to her to keep the standard of talent high while keeping ticket prices affordable. Learn more about the non-profit here: albertavocalarts.com.