About Illumni Men's Chorale

Illumni Men's Chorale is one of Seattle's newest Men's Ensembles.  

Founded in November 2009, the group can be best described as a bunch of guys who just like to sing! Membership is made up of everything from serious choral hobbyists, to some full time professional musicians.  The group also includes several instrumentalists, teachers, and church musicians.

Ages in the group range from 19 to 65, and we are open to all who wish to audition. 

Our unofficial motto is "Just Sing!"  We believe that so many people get tied up in the technicalities of the art and administration, that they forget to walk on stage and, "Just Sing!".  We strive to do this by having everything ready in advance, and having our skills up to 'snuff so that when it comes to concert time, we can "Just Sing!".  

Engaging our audience is very important to us.  We do this by performing innovative concerts, and asking our audience to become part of them.  We continuously pursue new songs and arrangments, and hope to present some of the most beautiful classical music ever written. At the same time, we are never afraid to bust out a classical arrangement of some Brittney Spears, or sing like the 'Chimpmunks' in the 'Christmas Song' if it helps bring our audience along for the ride!

The Men of Illumni are dedicated to our community and have consistently offered programs to help members of our community who may not otherwise by exposed to this type of music the chance to see our concerts.  These programs have included free tickets for low income families & those in need, and free tickets for members of our Armed Services and their families.

Where are the girls?  We get asked this question a lot.  Illumni has made a consistent effort to engage female artists for all our concerts, and we have yet to host a concert without one!  Guests Artists have included: Soprano Jennifer Ceresa of Seattle Opera & the Seattle Choral Company, Cora Rueter Foster of the Trans Siberian Orchestra, Harpist Tealah Hill of the Tacoma Symphony, Melanie Hariss - our first Associate Conductor, and the award winning local LiveWire Quartet! We thank these talented ladies for being part of our shows.

Well, that's about it for 'who we are'.  We'll leave some information below about what the group has done in the past 1.5 years.  If you'd like to support Illumni and what we do, you can visit the Support link on the left had side of our web page, or even grab a copy of our CD 'Lux Spiritu', also linked on the left.    We love to hear from our fans, so please add us on Facebook or Twitter, and say hi!

Thank You,

The Men of Illumni 

The Illumni Music Foundation is a licensed Domestic Nonprofit Corporation in the State of Washington, and is currently filing for Federal 501c3 not- for-profit status.

Illumni's members represent a wide swath of the Northwest, ranging from Poulsbo to Olympia, Seattle, Tacoma, Puyallup, Parkland and Bellingham.

Accomplishments in the past 1.5 years:

- Recording our first CD, "Lux Spiritu'.

- Recording background tracks for the sound track CD of the movie, "Christmas with a Capitol 'C'"

- Premiering no less than 13 new works & arrangements!

- Recording background tracks for a soon to be released Pop song.

- Presenting a free concert, which raised money for the James D Holloway Music Scholarship Fund.

- Performing at the NW Folklife Festival.

- Auditioning for America's Got Talent.

- Offering free concerts to low income families & members of our Armed Forces and their families.

- Had a lot of fun singing. :) 

On Being Green

One of our many goals as an organization is to be as friendly to our environment as possible.  We share all of our files electronically, and only print music and other items on an as-needed basis, so there is as little waste as possible.  We primarily do our advertising through online resources, and electronic means, tonkeep our actual printed advertisements and waste to the smallest size possible.

On Fiscal Responsibility

Illumni tries to make every dollar count.  By using resources like the Choral Public Domain Library, we are able to produce much of our music without cost.  We also have 6 members of the group who have, or are composing new pieces for Illumni to perofrm.  As mentioned in on environmental commitment, we do as much of our advertising online as possible, so there is no needless waste.  Our recordings are made at Jack Straw Productions, a non-for-profit recording studio that offers excellent prices to it's members.  Illumni also strongly believes in collaboration with other artists. Sometimes the things we can offer each other as artists are much more valuable than the fiscal equivalent.

On Community/Audience Outreach

No one will ever be turned away at the door to Concert Illumni hosts, as long as there are still seats.  We believe audience members who are willing to support us should be able to attend, regardless of their ability to pay. 

We appreciate the support of our paying audience members and donors, and couldn't do it without you!  Thank You!

Illumni is a combination of the words "Illuminate" & "Alumni".  Illuminate, because we belive music really does bring a 'light' into people's lives.  Alumni represents the fact that many of us have known each other for up to 18 years, have performed in several ensembles together before finding a home here.  "Illuminate" & "Alumni" = Illumni.   (pronunciation: Ih loom nee.) 

Alumni also has the root or "to nourish".  We believe we can all agree that music does a lot to enlighten & nourish all  our souls.