Down East Singers will begin its spring semester at 7 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 13, at the Nativity Lutheran Church, 179 Old County Road, Rockport, with registration and voice-placement checks for new singers starting at 6:15 p.m.

Anthony Antolini of Cushing, the group's artistic director, will return to the podium after a sabbatical leave during fall semester. He has conducted the ensemble since 1991.

Jennifer McIvor of Wiscasset is the rehearsal accompanist. The singers, approximately 70, travel to Tuesday rehearsals (7 to 9:15 p.m.) from throughout the Midcoast, from Newcastle to Belfast. Carpooling is available.

Sight-reading skills are desired but not required, as long as an ability to match pitch accurately is demonstrated. All singers are expected to work on their music at home between the weekly rehearsals.

The membership fee is $60 per semester, and high school students sing for free. Music for the semester will be provided on loan free of charge.

The chorus will be preparing for its annual Memorial Day Concert to be presented Monday, May 25, at Camden Opera House at 5 p.m.

The performance will include the world premiere of a work commissioned by Down East Singers in memory of Col. Robert Rheault by Brooklyn composer Elizabeth Brown entitled “To Walk Humbly.”

The piece is scored for chorus, piano and theremin, an electronic instrument played by moving the hands around an antenna. The theremin soloist will be the work’s composer, Elizabeth Brown.

Also on the program will be Dmitry Bortniansky’s anthem for a memorial occasion entitled “Kol’ slaven” in a newly published edition by Anthony Antolini. The concert will conclude with Igor Stravinsky’s “Symphony of Psalms,” rated the greatest classical composition of the 20thcentury by Time Magazine.

The Stravinsky work will be accompanied by the Mozart Mentors Orchestra, composed of string teachers and their top students, and will also include woodwinds, and percussion.

Down East Singers was founded in 1979 by Marion Gray and is open to all community members.

For more information, please visit www.downeastsingers.orgor call 207-619-0413.