Penn Singers is a student-run musical theater company that produces a Broadway-style show in the fall and a classical light opera or musical in the spring.
Mission and Vision
Penn Singers Light Opera Company is a four-year musical theatre company based at the University of Pennsylvania that values inclusivity of all genders, races, sexual orientations, and identities. We are a community of performers, musicians, and theatre technicians that is committed to producing professional-level musical theatre in a fun, welcoming, and social environment.
History
In 1957, two University of Pennsylvania students, Meryl Moss and Edie Herman, decided that the campus needed an outlet for female singers. The two therefore co-founded the Pennsyngers, an all-female chorus. In that first year, the women successfully directed themselves. The next year, Bruce Montgomery, then head of Student Performing Arts, hired Ernest Ganz as their director. A number of other directors followed over the next thirteen years.
Then, in 1970, the Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra premiered Bruce Montgomery’s “Herodotus Fragments”, written for orchestra and two choruses. The Pennsyngers performed, along with the Penn Glee Club. Thus began Monty’s relationship with the ‘syngers. In 1971, he took over as their director and made the group a co-ed ensemble. That year, they became the Penn Singers.
In 1972, the Penn Singers performed a two act show: the first act contained the Buxtehude Missa Brevis, Schubert’s Mass in G, and five pieces from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Jesus Christ Superstar. The second act was Gilbert and Sullivan’s Trial By Jury. The performance sold out before it opened.
After completing a show that ran the gamut of musical genres, the Singers had to decide which they would like to make their own; by unanimous vote, they selected light opera. The next year, the Penn Singers performed a fully-staged The Pirates of Penzance in the Zellerbach Theatre, starting a trend of successful light opera productions. A modernized, innovative version of Gilbert and Sullivan’s Patience was enormously well-received, and helped the Penn Singers to gain respect on campus. Penn Singers has have a tradition of performing a Gilbert & Sullivan light opera or a show of similar quality in the spring. The rest, as they say, is history!
Singers Stands With Black Lives Matter
Where You Can Donate
• The NAACP Legal Defense Fund
Educational Media
• 13th (documentary available on Netflix)
• #BecauseWe’veRead (website)
Penn Singers stands in solidarity with the Black community today and always. We condemn all forms of racism and refuse to be silent in the face of ongoing systemic racism. The loss of Black lives as a result of police brutality and racial hatred is abhorrent, and compels us to take immediate actions in the fight for racial justice.
We encourage everyone to stand with us as we advocate and act together in the fight against systemic racism and racial injustice. To be silent is to be complicit with the oppression of Black people in America and we will not tolerate such injustices.
As an organization, we have donated to the Louisville Community Bail Fund, which helps post bail for arrested protestors. Our membership also wants to highlight the following organizations in our fight against racial injustice, which we encourage you to donate to and support.
Black lives matter.
Land Acknowledgement
As a performing arts group operating out of the University of Pennsylvania, Penn Singers performs on Lenapehoking. Lenapehoking is the space we currently call Philadelphia, but this land was stolen from the Lenape people — the original stewards of this land. As such, we want to acknowledge that our work occurs on land belonging to the Lenape and voice our gratitude to the past and present generations of Indigenous people for the opportunity to live and learn in this space.