Choral Ensembles in American Normal Schools: Comparing Performance Offerings across Four Institutions, 1871–1926

• In Event: AERA Roundtable Session Friday 11:45 am
  In Roundtable Session: Musicking Normal Schools: Soundings of Capital, Gender, Race in Past, Current, Futures of Teacher Education

Abstract

This presentation explores the development and significance of choral ensembles at four American normal schools—Oshkosh State Normal School (WI), State Female Normal School (VA), Valley City State Normal School (ND), and Colorado State Normal School (CO)—from 1871 to 1926. Rooted in the late 18th-century tradition of Choral Societies, these ensembles played a central role in teacher training and reflected national values surrounding music education and cultural enrichment.
While elite Choral Societies emphasized European classical works, normal-school choral ensembles presented more diverse repertoires, including American folk songs, sacred music, and African spirituals. The most common ensemble form was the glee club, which existed at all four institutions in various formats: treble, low-voice, mixed-voice, or subdivided into smaller quartets. These ensembles varied in size and structure and generally rehearsed weekly for about an hour.
Primary sources—yearbooks, concert programs, and catalogs—offered evidence of ensemble names, voicings, conductors, and repertoire. For example, Oshkosh featured several ensembles, including the large-scale May Festival Chorus of 250 voices (The Quiver, 1914). Valley City offered both school and community groups such as the Normalonians and the Valley City Choral Society (Cornerstones, 1914). Colorado’s programs included operettas and mixed quartets, while Longwood (then State Female Normal School) maintained a longstanding all-female glee club directed by a succession of women.
A noteworthy pattern was the frequency of female leadership in these ensembles. Most choirs—especially treble groups—were directed by women, a significant finding given the era's broader employment limitations for women. These female conductors shaped the programs' quality and continuity and likely contributed to musical life beyond campus.
Repertoires included sacred, classical, and popular works, often showcased through annual concerts, operettas, and community events. For instance, Valley City performed Hiawatha” in 1917 (The Blizzard, 1917), Oshkosh staged The Mikado in 1924 and H.M.S. Pinafore in 1926 (The Quiver, 1924 & 1926), and Valley City produced The Walrus and the Carpenter in 1909 with a children’s chorus of 100 (Welsh, 1990). Concerts were typically held in churches, town halls, or at festivals and often served both educational and outreach purposes. Participation was occasionally integrated into the curriculum, further underscoring its value in teacher preparation. These schools also performed large-scale choral works such as Handel’s Messiah (Cornerstones, 1912) and Dvořák’s Ludmilla (Cornerstones, 1913).
The study concludes that these four institutions reflect broader national patterns in choral music within normal schools, revealing shared practices—such as common ensemble types, rehearsal formats, and curricular integration—alongside regional distinctions in ensemble names or musical selections. The historical significance of women’s leadership and the use of choral music to strengthen school-community ties are emphasized. This work contributes to understanding normal schools as crucial sites for participatory music-making and music-education leadership. Many of these choral traditions persist today within collegiate music programs.

Author

• Dawn M Farmer, Augustana College