Chor Leoni Announces New Digital Album This Air | This Earth

Chor Leoni Announces New Digital Album
This Air | This Earth

The album captures two world-premiere recordings exploring the human experience through sound

Vancouver, BC – Chor Leoni proudly announces the digital release of its new album, This Air | This Earth, on November 14, 2025. Featuring two major choral works commissioned by the choral organization, the recording showcases the Juno-nominated choir’s acclaimed artistry and signature depth of expression.

“A choir is a unique vessel to tell shared and communal stories,” says Artistic Director, Erick Lichte. “From our bodies, rooted in the earth, come sounds and singing, rarefactions and reverberations full of memories of the past and hope for our shared future. To me, this is what this album is about and what forms the connection between these two world-premiere recordings.”

Composed during his three-year tenure as Chor Leoni’s Composer in Residence, Canadian composer Don Macdonald’s “High Flight” is a lush six movement work that sets the words of RCAF soldier-poet John Gillespie Magee Jr. to music. Recorded at St. Andrew’s-Wesley United Church and featuring the talents of pianist Tina Chang and cellist Jonathan Lo, the twenty-minute composition traces the arc of a young soldier moving from life and innocence to war and wisdom, and from this world into the next.

“The work is a celebration of life, of soaring, of living and loving,” says Lichte. “This sumptuous music connects us with a young man, his beautiful mind, his idealism and his untimely death. This is a rare work which marks a death by honoring life so fully.”

Recorded at Chan Shun Concert Hall at the University of British Columbia, Dr. Melissa Dunphy’s piece, "The Things We Leave Behind”, invites listeners to explore humanity's legacies buried beneath the Earth’s surface and how they might appear to future civilizations. The work juxtaposes ancient and modern artifacts, from the stone-age Willendorf Venus to mass-produced novelty mugs, and tiny human-made particles embedded in a lake bed. The recording features harpist Vivian Chen and saxophonist Julia Nolan.

“Music can pull us quickly across time and space, but Things We Leave Behind overtly links the past, the now, and the future with uncommon heart, humor, honesty and beauty,” says Lichte. “In this work, we not only see, but feel our connection to our past and future and hopefully, a deeper sense of our shared humanity across the millenia.”

This Air | This Earth will be available for streaming on all major platforms beginning November 14, 2025.