Bellevue Chamber Chorus is in its fifth decade of bringing beautiful, inspiring, exciting choral music
to the Greater Eastside and Puget Sound region. Join us for our 43rd season!
Heart and Soul
The Music of Jake Runestad and Ola Gjeilo
Join us as we celebrate the “Heart and Soul” of choral music with two of the finest contemporary composers.
Jake Runestad, “one of the best of the younger American composers” (Chicago Tribune), is an EMMY®-winning and GRAMMY®-nominated composer and conductor. Many acclaimed ensembles have recorded his music, including VOCES8, Washington National Opera, the Los Angeles Master Chorale, the Munich Radio Orchestra, the Bavarian Radio Choir, the Netherlands Radio Choir, Seraphic Fire, the Santa Fe Desert Chorale, and many more. The Bellevue Chamber Chorus presents his “The Hope of Loving,” a multi-movement work for choir and string quartet. This expressive piece highlights the importance and impact of love — love shown to others and love shown to oneself, and it was recorded by professional American choir Conspirare and received a GRAMMY® nomination.
Norwegian composer and pianist Ola Gjeilo was born near Oslo in 1978 and moved to New York City in 2001 to begin his composition studies at the Juilliard School. Albums of Gjeilo’s choral music are some of the bestselling choral albums world-wide and include “Winter Songs” & “Dreamweaver”, featuring Tenebrae, Voces8 and the Choir of Royal Holloway. His global streams have now surpassed 330 million. The Bellevue Chamber Chorus presents two of his best-known works for choir, piano, and string quartet: “Luminous Night of the Soul,” and “Dark Night of the Soul.” Intended to be performed together, these pieces will transport you into a new reality with their beautiful wash of sound. A brilliant pianist himself, Gjeilo has perfected an ethereal and soulful combination of strings and piano that has surely granted him a spot in music history books for generations to come.
November 14, 2026, 7:30 PM
Hope United Methodist Church
1934 108th Avenue NE
Bellevue, WA
November 15, 2026, 3:00 PM
Emmanuel Episcopal Church
4400 – 86th Avenue SE
Mercer Island, WA
Tickets: https://www.ticketleap.events/events/bellevuechamberchorus
On Our YouTube Channel
Catch What You Missed
Couldn’t make it to a concert this season — or simply long to hear it again? Each program from our 2025–2026 season lives on on our YouTube channel. Settle in and enjoy.
Plus One: A Generation of Young Artists
Young artists in action
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About the Bellevue Chamber Chorus
The Bellevue Chamber Chorus, founded in 1984 in Bellevue, Washington, exists to bring beauty and artistic inspiration to the community through the choral arts.
We are an adult mixed chorus (18+ years) and rehearse Thursdays from 7:00-9:30 PM September through May at Northlake Unitarian Universalist in Kirkland.
A few notable facts about the chorus (click to expand):
- In 2024, we competed in the World Choir Games in Auckland, New Zealand and received a Gold Diploma. (See more…)
- We have performed around the world, including Carnegie Hall and the Sydney Opera House, and most recently in July 2017, at the 22nd annual Festival Chorale Internationale in Provence (and 4th annual in Aveyron).
- We were honored to win First Place at the Kathaumixw International Choral Festival in British Columbia (2008), in the Adult Mixed Chorus category.
- We’ve released 3 CDs over the years.
- We’ve commissioned several works by Northwest, national, and international composers over the years, including “Roots” by Ola Gjeilo, as part of a consortium through Chorus America. See our virtual premiere on our YouTube channel!
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Bellevue Chamber Chorus is proud to be a founding member of the Greater Seattle Choral Consortium, the non-profit organization that sponsors the Seattle Sings! Choral Festival. The GSCC is comprised of over ninety choral ensembles in the Puget Sound region, each of whom have a unique mission, but a common love of singing and choral music. Please visit our “neighbor” choirs and see what the GSCC is doing for advocacy and support of choral music in our community at www.seattlesings.org.
