Selections from the Great American Songbook to form the core of spring tour, performances by Singers.
COLUMBIA, KY. (08/26/2025) This school year will have several firsts for the Lindsey Wilson University Singers.
They will perform under a new director, and the members of the university’s premier vocal group learned Sunday evening that in 2025-26, most of them will explore a new part of America as well as a new part of American culture.
At the conclusion of the school year in May, the choral ensemble will head to Michigan, where they will perform at several of that state’s historic locations, including famed Mackinac Island. The tour will take place when the national commemoration of the semiquincentennial of American independence will be nearing its July 4 crescendo.
“As we turn this page of a new era in Singers history, I want you to think of this as a new journey,” said first-year Director of Choral Activities Jennifer Bersaglia. “This will be an exciting buildup to a spring performance and a tour that’s going to coincide with the 250th anniversary of American independence.”
In celebration of the American spirit of innovation and independence, Bersaglia told the Singers at a Sunday-evening reveal ceremony outside of the W.W. Slider Humanities Center that their concerts will include selections from the Great American Songbook. A pre-tour concert will be held in April.
“When I was putting this tour together, I was thinking that we have to celebrate the spirit of America,” said Bersaglia. “There is a spirit of innovation in America. America embraces independent thought. It is a spirit that inspires Americans to go into uncharted territory with relentless creativity. These are all things that the international community sees America as possessing.”
As Bersaglia told the Singers, the spirit of American innovation and creativity has manifested itself in rich musical genres, such as the blues and jazz — and also in the Great American Songbook.
Roughly defined as music created from the 1920s through the early 1960s, songs and melodies that make up what’s loosely called the Great American Songbook had their origins in musical theater, Hollywood and Tin Pan Alley, an area of New York City known for its prodigious output of popular songs in the late-19th and early 20th centuries.
Bersaglia told the Singers that they will perform selections from a very broad interpretation of the Great American Songbook.
And based on an informal survey of the Lindsey Wilson Singers, the May tour to Michigan will take them deep into a state few of them have explored. Even fewer were familiar with the Great American Songbook.
“I’m really looking forward to it,” said Sadie Kemp ’26 of Columbia, an elementary education major. “I enjoy any trip with the Singers, but I’m excited with the new group and Dr. Bersaglia.”
Fellow Singer Madeline Hardwick ’27 of Columbia said that the annual spring tour is usually one of the defining elements of the Lindsey Wilson Singers.
“Every time we go on tour, I make the best memories with my most favorite people,” said Hardwick, a secondary education major with emphasis in English.
But, as the other Singers said, Hardwick said she was less familiar with the style of music they will perform in 2025-26.
“I don’t know one song from the Great American Songbook, and I really don’t know what the Great American Songbook is,” said Hardwick. “But I’m going to learn it, and I’m sure I’m going to love it.”
Lindsey Wilson University Director of Choral Activities Jennifer Bersaglia reveals Sunday evening where the Lindsey Wilson Singers’ spring tour will take place in May 2026. The choral ensemble will perform selections from the Great American Songbook.
The Lindsey Wilson University Singers and Director of Choral Activities Jennifer Bersaglia, front left, gather Sunday evening on the steps of the W.W. Slider Humanities Center. The Singers’ spring tour will take place in May 2026, and the choral ensemble will perform selections from the Great American Songbook.
Lindsey Wilson University is a vibrant liberal arts university in Columbia, Kentucky. Founded in 1903 and affiliated with The United Methodist Church, the mission of Lindsey Wilson is to serve the educational needs of students by providing a living-learning environment within an atmosphere of active caring and Christian concern where every student, every day, learns and grows and feels like a real human being. Lindsey Wilson offers 28 undergraduate majors, five graduate programs and a doctoral program. The university’s 29 intercollegiate varsity athletic teams have won more than 120 team and individual national championships.
(Duane Bonifer – Lindsey Wilson University)