Choral Arts Northwest

Mission

Now concluding its 32nd season and fourth season with Artistic Director Timothy Westerhaus, Choral Arts Northwest is a choir of music educators and passionate avocational musicians who promote community and cross-cultural connections through the transformational power of choral music. We seek to foster a world that is just and empathetic and that values creativity and diversity. We dedicate ourselves to ongoing learning and listening and invite others to join us on that journey through programming, engagement, and partnerships with a diverse array of social, cultural, and community organizations.

Description

Made up of volunteer singers drawn almost exclusively from the Puget Sound region, CANW combines a deep sense of community with a passion for artistic excellence. While performing diverse repertoire from Renaissance polyphony through 21st-century masterworks, CANW retains an abiding commitment to new music and has commissioned and premiered new choral compositions annually since 2007. Our Composer-In-Residence programs have produced important commissions and residencies with composers such as Shawn Kirchner, John Muehleisen, Hyo-won Woo, Eric Barnum, Jake Runestad, Melinda Bargreen, Dale Trumbore, Jessica French, Reena Esmail, and John David Earnest. Our cultural collaborations are wide and diverse and include partnerships with the Solid Ground Housing Authority (www.solid-ground.org), Morningstar Korean Cultural Center, ECOSS. org, Birds Connect Seattle, and the Filipino Community of Seattle.

In 2025/26, we continued to explore our multi-year partnership with the Morning Star Korean Cultural Center (appearing with them in Benaroya Hall at Narae 2025: Bi Sang - Together We Soar), and with the Filipino Community of Seattle (performing at their 90th Anniversary Gala). We developed new partnerships with the National Nordic Museum in Ballard (where we offered a preview performance of our Dec Nordic Jul concert), regional Music Educators (Music Educators Sing In, March 2026), and Solid Ground Housing Authority (March 2026, where we commissioned and performed a new piece by Alex Nguyễn set to texts written by members of Solid Ground's Broadview community).  Our performing partners included our long-time collaborative pianist Serena Chin, violinist and hardanger fiddler Rachel Nesvig, pianist Amy Boers, the Boeing Employees Choir, flautist Erin James, clarinetist Florie Rothenberg, Baroque violinist Tekla Cunningham, sitarist Sampada Bhalerao, tablist Ravi Albright, and the Seattle Bach Festival Orchestra. Our season's programming includes performances of Alec Roth's Earthrise (in celebration of the Artemis space expeditions), Yuletide songs from Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and Iceland by Ørjan Matre, Gjermund Larsen, Frode Fjellheim, Gustaf Nordqvist, and Björk, Timothy Takash's At Home,  J. S. Bach's Magnifcat (BWV243), and Reena Esmail's This Love Between Us. In February 2026, Choral Arts NW was the featured choir in the Seattle Symphony's sold-out performances of the music from The Elden Ring video game franchise.

We invite you to partner with Choral Arts NW as we forge ahead with exciting new ventures, cross-cultural artistic partnerships, and community-building enterprises supporting diversity, equity, and justice throughout our region and across the world. 

Timothy Westerhaus, Artistic Director

Nick Fritschler, President, Board of Directors

Nicholas Gorne, Vice-President, Board of Directors

Emily Frisch, Treasurer, Board of Directors

Anna Frisch, Secretary, Board of Directors

Stacia Cammarano Sr, Board Member

Stacia Cammarano, Board Member

Annie Stanger, Board Member

Tiffany Walker, Board Member

Dinah Helgeson, Board Member

Miriam Anderson, Choir Manager & Board member

Philip Tschopp, Managing Director