Ensemble offers a chorus for interested high school age girls to pursue their love of singing as they take on more academic and community responsibilities and challenges. In addition to performing very challenging music of all genres, the Ensemble singers serve as cultural ambassadors for our community.
Concerta is the advanced girls ensemble made up of experienced and talented choristers ages 11 to 14. This ensemble has garnered acclaim for its performances throughout the Bay Area, delighting audiences with its sensitive performance of challenging repertoire. Concerta singers also participate in a week-long summer camp in August of each year.
Brava is made up of more experienced singers ages 10 to 12.The choristers develop advanced choral music skills and perform a wide variety of challenging repertoire in many different languages. Brava choristers are featured performers at community events and concerts.
Allegra offers an introduction to the choral experience for singers ages 9 to 11 years old. Singers in this ensemble develop vocal skills and musical literacy as the basis for challenging choral music. Singers also work on musicianship, sight-reading, and musical theory.
Repertoire is a beginning performance choir and stresses the fundamentals of choral singing. Choristers learn the basics of music literacy and sight-reading skills as well as developing the young voice. Singers also begin learning and performing songs in foreign languages.
From the moment a student joins one of our schools they are playing music; loud, on professional equipment with other musicians. Before long, our students are playing live rock concerts. These are not your old fashioned wait -through-fifty-other-students mangling-their-songs- until-your-child’s- turn-arrives recitals, but real rock concerts at real rock venues in front of real rock audiences.
The Trouvere choir is a subset of the Cantori choir. This elite subset is comprised of boys ages 10 to 14, and their goal is to be one of the best after school boys choirs in America. These choristers learn a more sophisticated repertoire and occasionally sing with the Troubadors. They have performed with the San Francisco Symphony and at events around the Bay Area, in addition to performing and touring with Cantori.
The Cantori choir is a performance choir comprised of boys roughly ages 8 to 11. These choristers often have the opportunity to travel around the Bay Area and the United States to give performances. Their rehearsals are repertoire-intensive, where they sing in two to three parts and continue more advanced music-reading techniques. Cantori have toured Arizona, Southern California, the Pacific Northwest, Canada, and Hawaii.
The Intermezzi choir is comprised of boys who have been promoted from Minstrels or who have some musical experience, ages eight and nine. In Intermezzi, choristers start to focus on repertoire and singing in parts. The director works with them on singing vowels and consonants. The Intermezzi music theory work consists of rhythm and solfege (Do-Re-Mi) work with the aim of having choristers read notes in a piece of music and not just words.
The Minstrels are the youngest and most inexperienced choristers of the Pacific Boychoir Academy, typically ages six and seven. Minstrels begin their PBA experience by learning all about music and teamwork. They work with Orff instruments to internalize beats and familiarize themselves with rhythmic patterns. Their music theory work focuses on the basics of music reading and singing, the different kinds of notes, how to breathe properly, etc.