Staff and Personnel

John H. Melcher, Music Director
John H. Melcher has been music director of the NWCS for over 25 years. His challenging repertoire for the group includes Faure's Requiem, Mendelssohn's Elijah, Haydn’s Mass in Time of War, Mozart’s Requiem, Beethoven’s Mass in C and Bach's Magnificat. He has also directed musical choral arrangements of such Broadway shows as Secret Garden, Show Boat, My Fair Lady, Into The Woods, Miss Saigon and Les Miserables.

Melcher graduated from Beloit College and received a master of music degree from the University of Michigan. He pursued postgraduate work at Westminster Choir College in Princeton, N.J., and at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago.

A tenor soloist in numerous classical works, Melcher directed several community theater productions of Broadway shows and Gilbert and Sullivan Operettas in Palatine and Park Ridge, Illinois. John conducted the first "Sing Along Messiah" in Park Ridge at the Pickwick Theatre. Melcher’s musical expertise has been tapped by the Chicago Master Singers, where he has filled the roles of lecturer, program notes author and workshop clinician. In 1998, John joined the staff of the Suzuki School of Elgin as staff accompanist and coach for the ensemble classes.

Since 1999, John has conducted the Lutheran Swing Choir (high school students) for the ELCA in its summer choir tour in southern and central Illinois. Melcher served as minister of music at the First United Methodist Church in Park Ridge for 14 years. A member of the American Guild of Organists, he joined the staff of Christ the Lord Lutheran Church in Elgin, Ill. in 1997, serving as cantor, organist, choral and hand bell choir director.

Lori Lyn Mackie, Pianist
Lori Lyn Mackie is active across the Chicago area as a collaborative pianist for both vocalists and instrumentalists. Frequently heard in concert with professional and semi-professional musicians, she also accompanies several high school music and theatre departments. For the past several years, Ms. Mackie has served as staff accompanist for the Chicago Chapter of NATS vocal competition. She also performs with the Lira Ensemble, a group dedicated to the performance of Polish music. Ms. Mackie was featured in 1991, 1993 and 1999 as piano soloist with the NWCS chorus and orchestra.

Lori is originally from Walloon Lake, Mich., and now lives in the Chicago area. She has studied at Interlochen, the Bay Conservatory, the Blossom Festival School and the Koninklijk vlaams Musiekconservatorium van Antwerpen, Belgium. Her teachers include August Huybrechts, Sylvia Traey, Thomas Doran, Gui Mombaerts and Bill Browning. She has worked on collaborative piano in master classes with Dalton Baldwin, Martin Katz and Menahem Pressler. She earned degrees in music and German from Albion College in Michigan and piano performance from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL.

Ms. Mackie has served on the staffs of Lyric Opera, Chicago Opera Theatre, Light Opera Works, the Chicago Tribune Charities’ production of the Nutcracker and the Latin School of Chicago. She is currently director of music at Our Savior's Lutheran Church in Burbank, IL and is pianist for Anshe Tikvah in Buffalo Grove.

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