The Milwaukee Choral Artists (MCA) is Wisconsin's premiere professional choral ensemble, and one of only a handful of professional women's choral ensembles in the country. With its signature lush sound, MCA brings a distinctive repertory of choral and vocal masterworks including well-known pieces, new music, seldom-performed works, and music of diverse cultures and historical periods to concert audiences throughout the region. Founded in 1998 as a chamber ensemble comprised of professional solo singers, MCA occupies a singular position of excellence in the city, state, and region. In December 2007, Tom Strini, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel's Music Critic, named the Milwaukee Choral Artists Present Music collaborative performance of Olivier Messiaen's "Trois Petites Liturgies" (with MCA's Sharon Hansen conducting) the #1 Performing Arts Event of the Year. In the 2008-09 concert season, Mr. Strini's wrote "Their singing was intelligent and beautiful without fail throughout an engaging and varied program. Arrangements of two Debussy songs gave them a chance to do what they do best of all, which is tune and balance complex chords so finely that the harmonies glow like a sonic aurora borealis". Regularly hailed for its imaginative programming, the group has quickly established itself in the mainstream of professional music making both within and beyond Milwaukee. Milwaukee Choral Artists enjoys regular appearances with Present Music, Milwaukee's internationally acclaimed contemporary music ensemble. In 2009, the Milwaukee Choral Artists joined Present Music in the world premiere of Alexandra du Bois' In Beauty May I Walk. Equally well versed in early music, the Milwaukee Choral Artists has performed twice with the internationally acclaimed The Boston Camerata, presented by Early Music Now (the Midwest's renowned early music presenting organization.) Last season, MCA was heard once again on the Early Music Now stage when the ensemble joined the professional female vocal ensemble KITKA in a collaborative concert. MCA has also performed as part of the Fine Arts Concert Series at the Cathedral of St. John the Evangelist (Milwaukee) and St. James Cathedral (Chicago); at the national convention of Catholic Cathedral Musicians; at the biennial conference of the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians; and in state and regional conventions of the American Choral Directors' Association. MCA has recorded two CDs. The latest is its first professionally produced CD "SKY-BORN Music, 10th Anniversary Commissions and World Premieres" on the Clarion label. This past summer, the Milwaukee Choral Artists was named a 2011 finalist in the American Prize Professional Choral Division, and was chosen as the recipient of a special citation from the American Prize for Unique Choral Programming for SKY-BORN Music. The other CD, released in October, 2009, is a live performance titled "Music for the Whole People of God" which was performed in August, 2009 at the Milwaukee Art Museum for the National Conference of the Association of Lutheran Church Musicians. The Milwaukee Choral Artists performs three regular season concerts each year at historic venues throughout the Milwaukee area. Committed to presenting music from diverse cultures, the ensemble has performed music in thirty languages from more than forty world cultures since its inception.