The Menlo Chorus is divided into three different choral groups.

• Knights and Knightingales is a mixed men and women select chorus of more advanced singers
• Lorelei is a select women's chorus of more advanced singers
• Merry Men is a select men's chorus

Chorus students have made concert tours to Scotland, the Czech Republic, Austria, Canada, Japan, and Spain. This year the Select Chorus will travel to New Zealand during Spring Break.

LINDA JORDAN, Chorus Director, has music degrees from Centenary College of Louisiana and the University of Texas in Austin and has been teaching at Menlo School since 1988. She has been pianist for many choral, theatrical, and instrumental groups in the San Francisco Bay Area and has directed church choirs for many years. At Menlo School, besides being choral director, she teaches Freshman Fine Arts, Music Theory, and has been the Music Director for many drama musicals. In 2001 she was awarded the Menlo Park Rotary Award as Menlo School 's "Teacher of the Year."

Chorus News 2005-2006

Carmina Burana Photos — Now available at Menlo Memories!

May 20–22—The Monterey Symphony and Symphony Chorus and the San Jose Symphonic Choir and their directors have invited the Menlo Chorus to participate in three performances of Carl Orff's "Carmina Burana" in the Monterey Area. The concerts are Saturday, May 20 in Salinas, and Sunday and Monday, May 21 and 22 at the Sunset Center in Carmel. The entire Menlo Chorus will go to Monterey on Friday and Saturday for rehearsals, then sing for the Saturday concert, but only the girls will sing for the performances in Carmel on Sunday and Monday, due to lack of space. Parents and friends are invited to attend the concerts.

The original "Carmina Burana" manuscript of poems and songs from the year 1230, mostly in Latin, with a few dialects of Middle High German and Old French, was found in the Benedictine monastery dating from 733 in Benediktbeuern, a village in the foothills of the Bavarian Alps near Munich, Germany. The modern musical setting of the poems by the German composer Carl Orff (1937) mixes highly rhythmic and percussive passages with tuneful sections. The lyrics cover a wide range of secular topics, as familiar in the 13th century as they are today: fickleness of fortune, nature of life, joy of spring, the pleasures of drinking, gluttony, gambling, and lust. The title means "Songs from Beuern," which is a variant of Bayern, the German name for Bavaria. It was first performed in 1937 and was an instant popular success.

1/23/2006—Audrey Chait, '07, soprano in the Knights & Knightingales, has been chosen for the California All-State Choir. The singers, chosen from high schools throughout the state, will meet and perform in Sacramento the week-end of March 9-11 at the CMEA Convention. Audrey was selected because of her high score on the Honor Choir audition, which included singing by memory of an Italian Art Song, sight-singing, ear training, and musicianship tests.