Our History
Ruth Datz, Dr. Richard Ingram, and Dr. Donald Williams – all leaders in Southeast Michigan’s choral community – founded the Ann Arbor Youth Chorale in 1987. Their purpose was to provide excellent, affordable choral training and performance to a diverse group of talented children. They believed that the music should reflect this diversity by representing a variety of cultures, languages, styles, and periods.
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Shayla Hottinger Powell has led Descant Choir since she established it in 1991. Since 2006, Bonnie Kidd has directed Concert Choir.
Through the years, AAYC has partnered with a long list of prominent performing arts organizations, including UMS, the Detroit, Ann Arbor, and Flint Symphony Orchestras, Arbor Opera Theater, Canadian Children’s Opera Chorus in Toronto, International Advent Festival in Prague, Peter Sparling Dance Company, UMS Choral Union, and University of Michigan choirs, orchestras and opera productions. As these collaborations suggest, our choirs are prized for their professionalism, careful preparation, and
exceptionally beautiful singing.
AAYC’s excellent reputation brings invitations from near and far to study, compete, and perform. We have sung in exciting venues, including Ann Arbor’s Hill Auditorium, Detroit’s Orchestra Hall, Chicago’s Symphony Hall, the Whiting in Flint, Disney World, and Saint Stephen’s Cathedral in Vienna, Austria. We have performed with the Chicago Children’s Choir, the MSU Children’s Choir, and with choirs in Cincinnati and Princeton.
