Resilience and Revelation at The Brick Church
I spent an afternoon at The Brick Presbyterian Church for The Dessoff Choirs' season opener, a concert called Resilience and Revelation. The program featured works by Herbert Howells, Philip Glass, Tania León, and Adolphus Hailstork, with Malcolm J. Merriweather conducting.
The Brick Church is one of those NYC venues that gives you everything you need as a photographer. The warm lighting from the chandeliers, the ornate architectural details behind the choir, those wooden pews creating natural leading lines. It's the kind of space where you can find compelling shots from multiple angles without moving much.
What struck me about this performance was the range. You had the full choir performing Howells' Requiem, then intimate solo moments with baritone Seth Velez and soprano Nicole Osmolovskaya. Piano interludes from Steven Ryan playing Philip Glass. Each piece required a different approach to capture the energy in the room.
I shoot a lot of performances in churches, and the challenge is always the same. You're working with available light, no flash, and you need to stay invisible. The audience is there for the music, not for camera clicks. So you find your spots early, set up for the compositions you want, and wait for the moments.
The soloists gave me some strong material to work with. There's something about a single voice filling a sanctuary that translates well in photos. You can see the concentration, the breath control, the connection between performer and conductor. Those are the shots that tell the story of what actually happened during the performance.
Churches present their own technical considerations too. This one was particularly low light, so I was shooting between 8,000 and 12,800 ISO for most of the concert. At those levels you're dealing with noise, but modern cameras handle it better than they used to. The alternative is motion blur or underexposed shots, and neither of those works for documentation.
This kind of documentation matters for arts organizations. They need these photos for grant applications, for promoting future seasons, for showing potential donors what their support makes possible. A well-shot concert photo can communicate the professionalism and artistry of an ensemble in ways that program notes alone can't.
The Dessoff Choirs have been around for over a century, and this was their 101st season opener. That's the kind of institutional history that deserves to be documented properly. Not just for marketing, but for the archive. Fifty years from now, someone might want to see what a Dessoff Choirs concert looked like in 2025.
If you're running a choir or managing a performance venue and need documentation that shows the quality of your work, that's exactly what I do. I've been photographing live performances in NYC for years, always staying out of the way while capturing what makes each concert unique.
You can see more of my performing arts work at www.danwrightphotography.com, or reach out here if you want to talk about documenting your next concert.
