The Albert Lea High School music department will present its first concert of the year Oct. 28. The concert will be at First Lutheran Church in Albert Lea.

This year there will be two different concerts to accommodate the growing music program and the large crowd. The concert at 6 p.m. will feature the ALHS Tiger orchestra, the eighth grade women’s choir and the Tiger choir.  The concert at 8 p.m. will be the symphony orchestra, varsity choir and concert choir.  The orchestras are directed by Rebekah Crissinger and the choirs by Mary Bissen and Diane Heaney.

The Tiger orchestra will perform arrangements of classical favorites including “Can Can,” “Ashokan Farewell” and “An Irish Party in Third Class.”  The symphony orchestra will perform a McLeod arrangement of Puccini’s aria “O Mio Babbino Caro” and the Brandenburg Concerto, No. 3.

All four choirs will perform both secular and sacred works.  Eighth grade women’s choir will perform the well-known “Dona Nobis Pacem” canon as well as new music from Jim Papoulis, titled “There is Peace.”  Tiger choir students will sing songs from Africa and Israel and will feature several soloists.  Varsity choir will sing pieces from the Quaker tradition, Africa and an American spiritual, “Climbin’ Up the Mountain.” Concert choir students are singing a double choir piece by Pachelbel in German as well as the hauntingly, beautiful “Requiem,” written by Gilkyson in honor of tsunami victims in 2004.  The concert choir will perform “Sacred Heart” by Ola Gjeilo with a string quartet and the finale will be “Weeping Mary” with three different choir groups surrounding the space.

Tickets for the concert are $7 for adults and $5 for seniors and students, and are available at the door.  There will also be a $35 family music concert pass sold at the door that will admit a family to all regular orchestra, band and choir concerts for the whole year.