A newsmaker you should know: Choral society director thinking an octave higher
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Thomas Octave, music director of the Westmoreland Choral Society.
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With a name like Thomas Octave, the question arises as to whether his appointment to music director of the Westmoreland Choral Society was serendipity or destiny.
Actually, the original rendering of his surname was Octavi, but, as happened with many immigrants, it was changed when his ancestors were processed through Ellis Island. They settled in Jeannette.
Mr. Octave was born in Latrobe, grew up in Monessen and lives in Oakmont with his wife, Elizabeth. He holds a bachelor's degree from Carnegie Mellon University and a master's degree from Duquesne University.
He is also music director of the Mount St. Peter Church, New Kensington; the Pittsburgh Festival Orchestra; and the Beit Benedict Peace Academy of the Dormition Abbey, Jerusalem, where a friend of Mr. Octave's, who is a monk, is in residence.
In addition, he is assistant professor of fine arts, Saint Vincent College, Unity, where he conducts the Saint Vincent College Singers and teaches voice, musical theater and opera.
If that seems a full plate, he has plenty of passion for all.
"I am probably every weekend conducting somewhere," Mr. Octave said, whether with a choral society, at a school or festival or during a workshop. "Your life is not what you get paid, but what you do."
Mr. Octave, who joined the WCS in the fall, is its third music director, following in the footsteps of founding director William Dovenspike and Marvin Huls.
He has great respect for Mr. Huls, from whom he inherited "wonderful singers and wonderful people to work with."
Mr. Octave said it was a good time to head the society, which is growing in programming and audience.
"We've had an ambitious year and will have an even more ambitious next year."
There are two programs remaining in this, the WCS 40th anniversary year: sacred music : Saturday and Sunday and film and stage music May 14.
The highlight of the 2011-2012 season will be a 9/11 memorial program to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the terrorist attacks. The program will be "more a meditation and remembrance, rather than a patriotism piece," Mr. Octave said. The chorus will be accompanied by the Pittsburgh Festival Orchestra, and the concert will be held in Greensburg.
Mr. Octave was attracted to the WCS by its mission statement, which emphasizes performance but also building community around a love of choral music and educating audiences, particularly youth, about it.
First Published March 31, 2011 6:03 am
