Diplomats from the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Los Angeles were invited to attend USC Thornton’s Winter Gala: Sounds of the Season on December 14, 2019. This annual gala concert was presented by over two hundred singers, instrumentalists, and conductors to celebrate the start of the holiday season.

The University of Southern California was the first university in the United States to create an undergraduate degree and a graduate degree in choral music, offered by the Thornton Department of Choral and Sacred Music. As Nieh Yen-Hsiang, a third-year PhD student from Taiwan majoring in Choral Conducting there on a Taiwan Ministry of Education Scholarship, explained, not all the performers on the night were from the music department: any USC student or faculty member can join a choir, regardless of their background or level of experience. Mr. Nieh is a member of the USC Thornton Chamber Singers and a conductor of the USC Thornton Apollo Chorus.

The Winter Gala concert also served as a special welcome for the university’s new president, Dr. Carol Folt. She enjoyed the evening sitting with the audience, and standing to join in sing-a-long sessions with everybody.

During the intermission, Rebecca Lan, Director of the Education Division at the TECO in LA office, and TECO colleagues Cathy Cheng, Viola Cheng, and Jack Jheng took a few minutes to speak with Dr. Folt and thank her for the wonderful evening. The new president extended an invitation to them to stop by her office at any time, and she mentioned that she plans to visit Taiwan in 2020. The TECO office is looking forward to offering any assistance for her visit, and for the USC Thornton Chamber Singers to go on a performance tour to Taiwan in 2020.