Haven presents
Soft Rains, Quiet Earth
Andrew Bortz, conductor
Sunday, November 2, 2025
4:00 pm at St. George’s Anglican Church
from the Artistic Director
About Haven
Haven grew out of the group of singers who came together to perform Path of Miracles for my final doctoral recital. The name reflects exactly what I hope Haven will be: a place where great singers can bring their whole selves to the music — where it’s safe to take risks, ask questions, and reach for our collective best. A place where every voice is valued not just for its skill, but for the person behind it.
Haven is now a professional-calibre ensemble made up of some of the finest choral singers in Western Canada. The vision is to grow into a paid, professional choir based in Edmonton.
Concert Programme
Soft Rains, Quiet Earth
Andrew Bortz, Conductor
The Night Is Darkening Round Me
Tõnu Kõrvits (b. 1969)
Erin Craig, soloist
Sea Drift
Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912)
Da Pacem Domine
Arvo Pärt (b. 1935)
In Paradisum: If I Should Go
Rebecca Dale (b. 1985)
Nicholas Allen, soloist
Im Herbste
Fanny Hensel (1805 – 1847)
There Will Come Soft Rains
Ivo Antognini (b. 1963)
Im Wald
Fanny Hensel (1805 – 1847)
Only In Sleep
Ēriks Ešenvalds (b. 1977)
Sarah Schaub, soloist
Lao Rahal Soti
Samih Choukeir, arr. Shireen Abu Khader (b. 1972)
Jane Berry, soloist
Meet Haven’s Artistic Director
Andrew Bortz
Andrew is a sought-after conductor, singer, composer, and collaborative pianist. He is the Artistic and Executive Director of the Edmonton Youth and Children’s Choirs, where he conducts both the Edmonton Youth Choir and Resound, a young adult ensemble for singers aged 18–40. He is currently pursuing a doctoral degree in choral conducting at the University of Alberta, where he directs the U of A Mixed Chorus.
Andrew has had the opportunity to work as both a conductor and singer with several of Canada’s leading professional choirs, including musica intima, Vancouver Chamber Choir, Luminous Voices, and Pro Coro Canada. Passionate about building community through music, he brings a creative and human-centered approach to his leadership on the podium.
Before moving to Edmonton, Andrew was the founder and artistic director of the Aurora Chamber Choir and served as assistant conductor for Vancouver’s Phoenix Chamber Choir and Chrysalis Vocal Ensemble. As a collaborative pianist, he is known for his sensitive and intuitive music-making, and has worked with high school, collegiate, and community choirs across Canada and the United States.
The Haven Singers
Nicholas Allen
Baritone Nicholas Allen is a native Calgarian who endeavoured into a life of music at an early age, making his start with the Calgary Boys’ Choir. He went on to sing for 2 seasons with the prestigious Vienna Boys Choir and many other choirs for the next 25 years. He completed his BMus at the University of Victoria, studying voice under Benjamin Butterfield and singing with the UVic Chamber Singers and UVic Vocal Jazz.
As a classical soloist he has performed with Early Music Voices, the Calgary Bach Society, the Calgary Philharmonic Chorus (where he also served as the Bass section principal), Mount Royal Kantorei, and sings often with Luminous Voices, where he was recently bass soloist in the Mozart Requiem. He currently teaches band and choir at a junior high and high school in Chestermere.
Dawn Bailey
Dawn holds a Bachelor of Music in vocal performance from the University of Toronto, a Master of Music in early music performance from McGill, and a Bachelor of Education from the University of Alberta. Dawn is a familiar face in Edmonton's choral and early music communities, performing often with Pro Coro Canada, Early Music Alberta, and the Alberta Baroque Ensemble.
She has performed and recorded extensively with early music ensembles in Canada and Europe, including appearing as a soloist on Ensemble Caprice’s Juno award-winning album “Vivaldi and his Angels." In addition to making music every day with her own three children, Dawn teaches grade one at the WISE Charter School for Waldorf Education.
Ian Bannerman
Ian is a conductor, soloist, teacher, and ensemble member with a distinct interest in vocal music. Ian has performed with the Vancouver Chamber Choir, musica intima, Early Music Vancouver, Victoria Symphony, Okanogan Symphony Orchestra, Voicescapes, Luminous Voices, and Early Music Alberta.
Ian conducts A Joyful Noise Monday Choir and teaches voice privately and as a sessional instructor of voice at Concordia University of Edmonton. Ian holds a B. Mus. from The University of British Columbia, and a B. Ed. and M. Mus. from The University of Alberta.
Jane Berry
Jane is an award-winning educator, composer, conductor, coach, and professional musician. She holds a Bachelor of Music in Composition, Bachelor of Education, Master of Arts in Music Theory, and PhD (abd) in Music Theory and Educational Psychology. She teaches music full time, conducts both ETown Minors and ETown Augmented, and performs with a wide variety of ensembles including FEMME Vocal Quartet, ProCoro Canada, and Vocal Renegades.
As a composer and arranger her works have been performed around the world and she is well known for using her voice and platform to amplify marginalized voices. In her spare time Jane is an avid painter, equestrian, volleyball player, and proud mother.
Samara Bortz
Samara believes that the greatest joy in this world is making music with the people that you love. She is the conductor of the Edmonton Youth Choir, helping her singers grow as young musicians, empathetic leaders, and thoughtful community members. Samara was the founder and artistic director of Crescent Choirs, an organization with more than 150 singers of all ages and levels.
Samara has sung with Pro Coro Canada, Phoenix Chamber Choir, Aurora Chamber Choir, and UBC's University Singers. She holds degrees in voice performance, historical musicology, and choral conducting from Mount Allison University and the University of British Columbia. Outside of the rehearsal room, you'll find Samara running her design and digital marketing studio, running in the river valley, and running after her toddler.
Sable Chan
Sable sings with ensembles such as, Pro Coro Canada, FEMME Vocal Ensemble, and Canadian Chamber Choir. Sable has also been working as a Speech-Language Pathologist in private practice and specializing in the area of voice therapy for the past 12 years.
She is the author of The Choir Girl Blog, where she publishes articles and interviews with choral individuals from across Canada. In 2019, she named Top 40 Under 40 by Edify Magazine.
Erin Craig
Erin (they/them) is a conductor, vocalist, composer, keyboardist, and educator born and raised in Edmonton. They spend most of their time planning seasons and leading rehearsals for Accord Ensemble and Edmonton Vocal Minority; teaching piano, voice, and music theory students and coaching new teachers in their studio; and writing music for choir, organ, and piano. When they aren’t doing something music-related, you can usually find them playing video games, hyper-focusing on a new art or craft, writing stories, or serenading their cats, Sif and Dale, with their partner, Matthew.
Erin is a proud advocate for gender equality and diversity in music. In their work as a choral conductor, they always aim to program music by composers of diverse backgrounds at parity with, or over and above, music from the Western Classical canon. They believe that performers and audiences alike are enriched by experiencing music outside the choral norms, and are always searching for music by composers who are yet unknown to them.
Graeme Climie
Graeme is a Calgary-based singer, arts administrator, and choral specialist with experience across a wide range of ensembles and styles. He has performed with Luminous Voices, Pro Coro Canada, the Elora Festival Singers, Calgary Opera, Spiritus Chamber Choir, and others, and co-founded the Vocal Renegades Collective. A four-time member of the National Youth Choir of Canada, he is currently Bass Section Leader of the World Youth Choir, where he has represented Canada since 2019.
Graeme serves as Assistant Director and Business Manager of Cantaré Children’s Choir, an organization he’s been part of for over 23 years. He holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Calgary and also works as a freelance marketing agent for arts organizations, combining business expertise with a passion for videography.
Stephen Duncan
Stephen is a classically trained singer from Vancouver, known for his warm tone, expressive phrasing, and captivating stage presence. Stephen is a lover of both traditional and contemporary repertoire and has performed with professional choirs, operas and symphonies across the country and internationally.
Beyond the stage, Stephen is deeply inspired by spending time with nature. Whether hiking through the mountains, skiing in the rockies or surfing on the island, he finds that spending time with the beauty of the natural world profoundly influence his artistry and expression. For Stephen, music and nature are intertwined - both offering a sense of peace, connection, and renewal that he strives to share through every performance.
Jolaine Kerley
Edmonton-based soprano and conductor, Jolaine Kerley is active as a soloist, voice instructor, choral conductor, adjudicator, and clinician. She is currently Associate Professor of Music at Concordia University of Edmonton as well as artistic director of Ariose Choir and conductor of the Archbishop Jordan Choirs. Jolaine holds degrees in Voice and Choral Conducting from the University of Alberta and Indiana University.
Jolaine has performed numerous times locally, nationally and internationally as a professional soloist and chorister with multiple choruses, orchestras, and organizations including the Stuttgart Kammerkor, Musica Ficta, Carmel Bach Festival, Portland Symphony Chorus, RES, Pro Coro Canada, ABE, Early Music Alberta, Westminster Choir, and was heard as soprano soloist in Allan Bevan’s Nou Goth Sonne Under Wode at Carnegie Hall.
Christian Maxfield
Christian is a Grade 2 teacher at SML Christian Academy in Stony Plain, Alberta. A graduate of Concordia University of Edmonton, he completed a B.A. in history and music (voice) in 2017 and a Bachelor of Education in 2019.
Christian conducts the Spiritus boys’ choir of the Edmonton Youth and Children’s Choir organization and sings regularly with Pro Coro Canada and other ensembles in the Edmonton area. In his free time, Christian enjoys time with friends and family, cooking, reading, and keeping active.
Abby Mendola
Abby is an Edmonton-based mezzo-soprano whose discovery of choir in high school opened the door to a career in singing. A recent graduate of Concordia University of Edmonton, she holds a Bachelor of Arts in Music (voice) and certificate in Vocal Pedagogy and Performance.
Abby has appeared with many choirs in the Edmonton area, including Chronos Vocal Ensemble, Ariose Treble Choir and Pro Coro Canada, and she is a scholar with the Edmonton Youth and Children's Choirs. When she isn’t singing, Abby enjoys trying new latte recipes and walking around with her camera.
Sarah Schaub
Sarah has performed as a soloist for music organizations throughout Western Canada. In addition to her work as a soloist, Sarah works as a professional chorister with Pro Coro Canada. Sarah Schaub has a Bachelor of Music, a Bachelor of Education, and a Masters in Education.
Sarah is passionate about bringing high-quality music education to children. She teaches elementary music with Elk Island Catholic Schools in Fort Saskatchewan, is the Past-president of the Alberta Kodály Association, conducts the youngest singers in Angeli with Edmonton Children's Choirs, and is mom to Henry and Maggie.
Tim To
Born and raised in Edmonton, Tim can be found singing in a variety of ensembles in the city — renaissance polyphony with some, and percussive accompanying bass lines with others.
Outside of rehearsal, he is an elementary music teacher, and loves all things to do with learning and pedagogy, music or otherwise.
Amy Voyer
Amy is an all-round fixture of the Edmonton choral scene. She teaches elementary music, sings professionally with Pro Coro Canada and FEMME Vocal Ensemble, and conducts three children’s choirs: Luminaria and Harmonia with The Edmonton Youth and Children’s Choirs, and Tamariki with Korora Choirs.
She holds Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Education degrees from Concordia University of Edmonton. Amy is known for her exuberance and her artistry, her ability to foster joyful and inclusive music-making communities, and the sound of her unmistakable laugh!
Jessica Wagner
Jessica holds a Masters in Performance at the University of Victoria, having studied under Benjamin Butterfield. As a singer, Jessica has a diverse repertoire and performance interest, and has studied at baroque academies and contemporary music labs here in Canada, The United States and in Europe. Jessica has performed as a soloist for choirs, orchestras and ensembles.
Jessica is especially passionate about working with composers on new music and has performed many Canadian and world premieres. Jessica regularly sings with ensembles here in Edmonton including Pro Coro Canada and the St. Joseph’s Basilica Schola Cantorum.
Andrew Whiteside
Born in Richmond British Columbia, Andrew is an avid conductor, tenor soloist, and chorister living in Edmonton for the past four years. He holds a BA in Music degree from Trinity Western University and a MMus in Choral Conducting from the University of Alberta. Choirs that Andrew works with regularly are ProCoro Canada, Kappella Kyrie as assistant conductor, the Richard Eaton Singers, and the Joyful Noise choirs.
Andrew is also Worship Coordinator at Inglewood Christian Reformed church working as an organist and contemporary music worship leader.
Anthony Wynne
Anthony was born and raised in Edmonton, and has sung in a variety of choirs in the city throughout most of his life. He currently sings with Pro Coro Canada, the Schola Cantorum at Saint Joseph's Cathedral Basilica, and A Joyful Noise.
Texts & Translations
The Night Is Darkening Round Me (Kõrvits)
Text: Emily Brontë
The night is darkening round me,
The wild winds coldly blow;
But a tyrant spell has bound me
And I cannot, cannot go.
The giant trees are bending
Their bare boughs weighed with snow;
And the storm is fast descending,
And yet I cannot go.
Clouds beyond clouds above me,
Wastes beyond wastes below;
But nothing drear can move me—
I will not, cannot go.
Sea Drift (Coleridge-Taylor)
Text: Thomas Bailey Aldrich
See where she stands, on the wet sea-sands,
Looking across the water:
Wild is the night, but wilder still
The face of the fisher’s daughter.
What does she there, in the lightning’s glare,
What does she there, I wonder?
What dread demon drags her forth
In the night and wind and thunder?
Is it the ghost that haunts this coast?—
The cruel waves mount higher,
And the beacon pierces the stormy dark
With its javelin of fire.
Beyond the light of the beacon bright
A merchantman is tacking;
The hoarse wind whistling through the shrouds,
And the brittle topmasts cracking.
The sea it moans over dead men’s bones,
The sea it foams in anger;
The curlews swoop through the resonant air
With a warning cry of danger.
The star-fish clings to the sea-weed’s rings
In a vague, dumb sense of peril;
And the spray, with its phantom fingers, grasps
At the mullein dry and sterile.
O, who is she that stands by the sea,
In the lightning’s glare, undaunted?—
Seems this now like the coast of hell
By one white spirit haunted!
The night drags by; and the breakers die
Along the ragged ledges;
The robin stirs in his drenchéd nest,
The hawthorn blooms on the hedges.
In shimmering lines, through the dripping pines,
The stealthy morn advances;
And the heavy sea-fog straggles back
Before those bristling lances.
Still she stands on the wet sea-sands;
The morning breaks above her,
And the corpse of a sailor gleams on the rocks—
What if it were her lover?
Da Pacem Domine (Pärt)
Text: Latin hymn (6th–7th century)
Da pacem, Domine, in diebus nostris,
quia non est alius qui pugnet pro nobis,
nisi tu Deus noster.
Give peace, Lord, in our time,
for there is no one else who fights for us,
if not you, our God.
In Paradisum: If I Should Go (Dale)
Text: Joyce Grenfell
If I should go before you do,
Break not a flower nor inscribe a stone,
Nor speak in a Sunday voice,
But be the usual selves that I have known.
Weep if you must;
Parting is hell.
But life goes on,
So sing as well.
Im Herbst (Hensel)
Text: Johann Ludwig Uhland
Seid gegrüßt mit Frühlingswonne,
Blauer Himmel, goldne Sonne!
Drüben auch aus Gartenhallen
Hör' ich frohe Saiten schallen.
Ahnest du, o Seele wieder
Sanfte, süße Frühlingslieder?
Sich umher die falben Bäume!
Ach, es waren holde Träume.
Greetings to you with Spring’s delight,
Blue heavens, golden sun!
Over there, from the garden hall
I hear joyful strings resounding.
Do you sense once more, O soul,
Gentle, sweet songs of spring?
Look around at the pale trees—
Ah, they were lovely dreams.
There Will Come Soft Rains (Antognini)
Text: Sarah Teasdale
There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white,
Robins will wear their feathery fire
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;
And not one will know of the war, not one
Will care at last when it is done.
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree
If mankind perished utterly;
And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn,
Would scarcely know that we were gone.
Im Wald (Hensel)
Text: Emanuel von Geibel
Im Wald, im hellen Sonnenschein,
Wenn alle Knospen springen,
Dann mag ich gerne mittendrein
Eins singen.
Wie mir zu Muth in Leid und Lust,
Im Wachen und im Träumen,
Das stimm ich an aus voller Brust
Den Bäumen.
Und sie verstehen mich gar fein,
Die Blätter alle lauschen,
Und fall’n am rechten Orte ein
Mit Rauschen.
Und weiter wandelt Schall und Hall,
In Wipfeln, Fels und Büschen.
Hell schmettert auch Frau Nachtigall
Dazwischen.
Da fühlt die Brust am eignen Klang,
Sie darf sich was erkühnen—
O frische Luft: Gesang! Gesang
Im Grünen!
In the forest, in the bright sunshine,
When all the buds spring forth,
There I would gladly in their midst
Be singing.
As I feel in sorrow and joy,
In waking and in dreaming,
So do I sing with all my heart
To the trees.
And they understand me well;
The leaves all listen,
And join in at the right place
With rustling.
Sound and echo travel farther,
In treetops, rocks, and bushes.
The nightingale also sings brightly
Among them.
Then the heart feels from its own song
That it may venture something—
O fresh air: singing! singing
In the countryside.
Only In Sleep (Ešenvalds)
Text: Sarah Teasdale
Only in sleep I see their faces,
Children I played with when I was a child,
Louise comes back with her brown hair braided,
Annie with ringlets warm and wild
Only in sleep, time is forgotten:
What may have come to them, who can know?
Yet, we played last night as long ago,
And the dollhouse stood at the turn of the stair.
The years had not sharpened their smooth round faces,
I met their eyes and found them mild.
Do they, too, dream of me I wonder,
And for them am I, am I too a child?
Lao Rahal Soti (arr. Arr. Abu Khader)
Text: Samih Choukeir
مكرجانح لحرتب ام يتوص لحر ول
مكعم يبلقو اركب ىلع ينويع
يناغلأا ّ لضتب يّ نغملا حار ول
يناعتبلاو ةروسكملا بولقل عمجت
If my voice departs, your voices will not
I look to tomorrow and my heart is with you
If the singer goes, the songs will remain
Bringing together the broken and suffering hearts
Thank you for joining us today!
Save the Date
The next Haven concert is on Sunday, February 8th. Follow us on Instagram for updates! Our website is launching next month–stay tuned.