(BERKELEY HEIGHTS, NJ) -- Wharton Arts, New Jersey's largest non-profit community performing arts education center, announced that it is the recipient of the 2024 Dale Warland Singers Commission Grant, which will support a composition from composer William Linthicum-Blackhorse to be premiered by Wharton Arts' New Jersey Youth Chorus.

Chorus America and the American Composers Forum partner to present this grant, which supports a chorus entering into an artistically meaningful and mutually beneficial partnership with a composer to contribute a new work to the choral repertoire. A panel curated by Chorus America selects the annual grantee.

With the 2024 grant, Wharton Arts will commission Linthicum-Blackhorse to compose an original work based on the speech “Long Ago When They Lived in the East” given by now-deceased native Lenape speaker Nora Thompson Dean. This piece, through the use of English and the Lenape languages, aims to shed light on the true history of the Lenape people who were forcibly removed from their ancestral home where the US states of New Jersey, Delaware, and New York are today. Engaging with the Delaware Nation of Oklahoma’s revitalization resources, composer Linthicum-Blackhorse seeks to honor the cultural heritage and stories of the Lenape people, so that audiences throughout the Lenape ancestral homelands and beyond will hear a language once native to these lands and a history nearly forgotten. The finished work will be premiered by the New Jersey Youth Chorus, a program of Wharton Arts, in May 2025.

“The New Jersey Youth Chorus is so thrilled and honored to receive Chorus America’s Dale Warland Singers Commission Grant,” said NJYC Founder and Director Trish Joyce. “It will make for a very exciting 2024-25 season, and an incredible opportunity for our choristers! Education is central to our mission, and we are planning to create additional materials, including an enrichment guide and a simplified recording of the commissioned piece, that can be used by fourth grade teachers across the Garden State as part of their core curriculum of the history of the Lenape in New Jersey. We hope these materials, as well as the commissioned work by William Linthicum-Blackhorse, will be a perfect complement to celebrating Native American Heritage Month for years to come.”

Said Wharton Arts Executive Director Gina Caruso, "Wharton Arts is deeply honored to be the recipient of the prestigious Chorus America grant. We are thrilled that the New Jersey Youth Chorus will premiere Composer Linthicum-Blackhorse's remarkable work, which will illuminate the cultural legacy and profound history of the Lenape people in this region."

This grant is made possible by the Dale Warland Singers Fund for New Choral Music, a permanently restricted endowment fund established in 2004 to honor Warland and the Singers. The selected chorus receives a grant of $10,000, $7,500 of which supports the commissioning fee and $2,500 of which supports engagement with the project composer, and production and promotion costs to present the project. In the 2024 cycle, children and youth choruses were eligible to apply for the grant.

"We are honored to be selected for the Dale Warland Singers Commission Grant," said Helen H. Cha-Pyo, Artistic Director of Wharton Arts. "As we endeavor to learn, share, and preserve the history and language of the Lenape people—and in alignment with our commitment to amplifying the voices of LGBTQ+, BIPOC, women, and other underrepresented composers—it is our hope that this project will serve as a powerful educational and artistic tool, fostering understanding and appreciation for indigenous languages and histories among youth in New Jersey and beyond, while honoring the Lenape people, on whose ancient homelands we are standing.”

Visit chorusamerica.org/grants to learn more about Chorus America's Dale Warland Singers Commission Grant.

The mission of Wharton Arts is to offer accessible, high quality performing arts education that sparks personal growth and builds inclusive communities. Wharton Arts’ vision is for a transformative performing arts education in an inclusive community to be accessible for everyone.

Wharton Arts is New Jersey’s largest independent non-profit community performing arts education center serving nearly 2,000 students through a range of classes and ensembles. The 5 ensembles of the New Jersey Youth Chorus, an auditioned choral ensemble program for students in grades 3–12, encourage a love and appreciation of choral music while nurturing personal growth and creative development. The 15 ensembles of the New Jersey Youth Symphony, which serve nearly 600 students in grades 3–12 by audition, inspire young people to achieve musical excellence through high-level ensemble training and performance opportunities. Based in Paterson, the Paterson Music Project is an El Sistema-inspired program of Wharton Arts that uses music education as a vehicle for social action by empowering and inspiring young people to achieve their full potential through the community experience of ensemble learning and playing. From Pathways classes for young children to Lifelong Learning programs for adults, the Wharton Performing Arts School has a robust musical theater and drama program and offers both private and group classes for instruments and voice for all ages and all abilities. With the belief in the positive and unifying influence of music and that performing arts education should be accessible to all people regardless of their ability to pay, Wharton Arts offers need-based scholarships.

Wharton Arts is located in Berkeley Heights, New Providence, and Paterson, NJ and reaches students from 12 counties. All of Wharton Arts’ extraordinary teaching artists, faculty members, and conductors hold degrees in their teaching specialty and have been vetted and trained to enable our students to achieve their personal best.