Collins Classical Entertainment Agency

Tenor for Sunday’s Bach Vespers is Ben Caston!
Bach Vespers featuring BWV 69 Erhalt un, Herr, bei deinem Wort
Tenor Ben Caston has been praised as “a pleasantly sinewy tenor” in Highland Park Chorale’s March 2023 performance of Bach’s St. Matthew Passion at Moody Performance Hall in the Dallas Morning News. Recent performances include the Evangelist role in Chilcott’s St. John Passion, Haydn’s Schöpfungsmesse, Bach’s Magnificat, Gabriel Jackson’s Requiem, and several Bach cantatas. In 2015 and 2017, Caston performed Handel’s Messiah in Fort Worth’s Bass Hall with the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra and was lauded for the lyric quality of his voice. Other performances include Mozart’s Mass in C Minor, Mozart’s Requiem, Mendelssohn’s Elijah, Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Orff’s Carmina Burana, Schubert’s Mass in G, Handel’s Messiah, Honegger’s King David, Saint-Saëns’s Oratorio de Noël, Teichler’s The Good Samaritan, and Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music with various choral societies, symphony orchestras, and colleges in Texas, Georgia, and South Carolina.

A native of Liberty, Mississippi, Caston is a graduate of William Carey University (1996) in Hattiesburg, MS, and New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, where he earned a Master of Music (1998) and Doctor of Musical Arts (2005), each with an emphasis in church music and voice. He has completed additional graduate coursework in choral conducting through Westminster Choir College and is a Distinguished Voice Professional through the New York Singing Teachers’ Association. He has completed Levels 1-3 of Somatic Voicework™, The LoVetri Method. Caston serves as Professor of Voice and Chair of the Performance and Pedagogy Division in the School of Church Music and Worship at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, where he teaches applied voice, voice pedagogy, and directs the Southwestern Singers.

Since 1994 Caston has served Baptist churches in Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia, and Texas in music ministry. He currently serves as the minister of music at Gambrell Street Baptist Church. Caston is an active member of the National Association of Teachers of Singing, American Choral Directors Association, and The Southern Baptist Church Music Conference. He and his wife, Rebecca, have two children, Clay and Sydney, and they live in Fort Worth.

Bridget Cappel is our alto soloist in tomorrow’s Bach Vespers at Zion Lutheran at 6 pm.

Mezzo-soprano turned coloratura soprano, Bridget is swiftly establishing herself as a rising star in opera, renowned for her commanding stage presence, soaring coloratura, and sumptuous tone. Bridget captivates audiences with a versatile repertoire spanning traditional operatic classics, early music, contemporary American works, and musical theater. She has garnered critical acclaim for her “beauty of tone and honesty of feeling,” and been lauded for her “supple, beautifully focused voice” (Boston Musical Intelligencer, San Diego Story). She recently made a welcome return to the Fort Worth Opera stage in Adamo’s Little Women, performed a concert with the Puccini Society of Dallas, joined Jake Heggie and the Cliburn Foundation in recital, and has sung throughout the country at companies including Kentucky Opera, Opera NEO, Painted Sky Opera, The Glimmerglass Festival, Shreveport Opera, and Des Moines Metro Opera, among others. Outside of solo performance, Bridget sings as a section leader at St. Andrew’s Methodist Church in Plano, and runs a thriving private voice studio with students in the DFW metroplex, across the country, and abroad.