6 day Itinerary for 2012 Singdownunder Festival Visit

Day 1 Tuesday June 26 Arrival afternoon

Day 2 Wednesday After a breakfast in the hotel transfer to Aorere College for Maori Choral Workshop.   Program includes

• Maori welcome, Powhiri with speech and song from hosts and guests
• learning a Maori choreographed action song taught in sections by sections of the host choir, Sweet Sixteen
• welcome to the Maori Department of the school
• sharing a Maori “Hangi” lunch with the school’s Kapa Haka (Maori Cultural) group in the Maori dapartment.
• participation in the Aorere College unique “singing assembly” under choral director Douglas Nyce including coperformance of Maori song with host choir
• learning the long and/or short poi under instruction.  (See the ladies of the Patea Maori Club)

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“In the Jungle”, “Shosholoza”, from the Front Row Choir

The Front Row Choir (TTBB) seemed to have developed this track by putting together two songs of South African origin. “In the Jungle” started its life as “Mbube” first recorded in 1939 by Solomon Linda and his group the Evening Birds.

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SingDownunder and the Christchurch Earthquake

At 1pm (NZT) on Tuesday February 22nd Christchurch city centre was partially destroyed by a shallow earthquake almost directly underneath it.  There is substantial loss of life and many major and historic buildings in the centre of town are partly or wholly destroyed.  The destruction includes two of the beautiful choral venues, the Anglican Cathedral in Cathedral Square  and the Catholic Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament that we sang in last year.

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Pokarekareana, from “The Front Row Choir”

Pokarekareana is a Maori love song.  It is anthemic in New Zealand and widely know internationally thanks to Dame Kiri te Kanawa, and Hayley Westenra.  It is claimed by different regional Maori groups by inclusion of their local placenames.  In this unusual presentation the Front Row Choir sings both in Maori and in English.

The Front Row Choir is a boys choir, from prominent choral school Aorere College.  The “Front Row” of their name is a set of positions in a rugby team.  The boys wear their rugby uniform when performing on stage.   They are ably directed by student William Pati.

The Front Row choir was clearly the crowd favourite at the festival and awarded as such.  They moved beautifully with their songs,  they sang with obvious power, and they were boys.

Lessons from the Inaugural SingDownunder Festival, 2010.

SingDownunder gives opportunities for international choirs to tour New Zealand. It particularly gives them four opportunities in New Zealand, none of which might be available otherwise.

1. It negotiates for visiting choirs to outreach with Maori and Polynesian choirs which are uniquely available in New Zealand, particularly Auckland.

2. It provides a competition/workshops/massed choirs/concert opportunity in Auckland’s best venue and with best resources (eg sound engineer, adjudicators).

3. It draws the choirs of metropolitan Auckland together at the competition and gives the visiting choirs the chance to see some of New Zealand’s best young choirs.

4. It creates a shared and partly shared touring itinerary in which international choirs visit New Zealand’s most famous scenic areas and sing with choirs and music groups in often beautiful small venues.

SingDownunder is also a means of achieving more international exposure for New Zealand choirs, particularly those not likely to be able to tour internationally and some who might not even get to sing in New Zealand’s main centres.

These ideas were supported by the inaugural event. All of the elements of the festival seemed to make up a diverse interesting appropriate experience for the Australian group. The NZ Choirs that participated, either in Auckland or in the hinterland, seemed to love the chance that the visitors brought.

The Australians included 10 choristers who were 19-21, ie older than any NZ school chorister, but there was no problem with this. The experience suggested that American junior college choirs can participate appropriately, for instance.

The feedback from the New Zealand choirs and correspondence from overseas suggests SingDownunder will have more choirs next year.

Feedback from our Musical Director, David Hamilton

David Hamilton

SingDownunder Festival

The words of one of my own students said it all: “Yesterday was awesome and fun and I can’t wait until next year for it again.” SingDownunder launched successfully at the end of July with 11 Auckland choirs performing and competing alongside the Youth Chorale of the National Children’s Choir and Youth Chorale of Australia. Covering a wide range of music, the competitive aspect of the event allowed choirs to show off their best singing. Choirs from south Auckland such as Multichoral (Mangere College) and Front Row Choir (Aorere College) brought with them pieces from the Maori and Polynesian tradition which were received enthusiastically by the assembled audience. Other choirs stuck more closely to traditional choral repertoire, with many including pieces by New Zealand composers. Read more

National Children’s Choir of Australia 2010 itinerary

The NCCA came to New Zealand late on July 28th and was hosted in Auckland by the Choralation choir of Westlake Boys and Girls High Schools led by Rowan Johnstone.  Their busy schedule was as follows:

July 29th Full day Maori Choral Workshop with Hangi meal hosted by Aorere College’s “Sweet Sixteen” Choir led by Douglas Nyce.

July 30th and 31st Two day choral competition, workshops, massed choir rehearsals and recordings.

August 1 Flew to Queenstown

6pm Recital in St Peters Church, Queenstown with the Central Otago Regional Choir directed by John Buchanan

August 2nd Recital in the Mercure Hotel.

August 3rd Daytime skiing in the Cadrona Valley

August 4th lunchtime Concert at Geraldine Primary School with the Colla Voce Choir conducted by Shirley Lindroos from Geraldine High School

7pm concert in St John’s Church with the Mt Hutt College Choir directed by Thirza Currie and the Crescendo Light Orchestra conducted by Lyn Blackwell at St Johns Church Methven.

August 5th 7pm concert in the Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament in Barbadoes St, Christchurch with the choir and orchestra of Christchurch Boys High School and the Cathedral Choir all led by Don Whelan.  This cathedral, a wonderful place for a choir to sing, was not broken in the subsequent earthquake but was cracked badly enough to be out of commission in the interim.

August 6th On the plane back to Melbourne

New Zealand Summer Holiday Time

Dear Singers,

The World Choral Tour is over and we’ve returned to settle in New Zealand. Christmas and New Year celebrations are added to summer holiday activities here so it has been a rather busy time re-establishing ourselves and beginning to play our part again in the New Zealand scene. Just at the moment schools are closed and people are away on holiday. I’ve been swimming in the surf again and it is lovely.

We saw about twenty choirs on the tour, in Australia, Europe and the US. Almost all responded very positively and many of them expressed an intention to come to our festival sooner or, probably, later. It takes a long while considering such a big venture, and longer again to organise a group of 30-40 singers to travel to New Zealand. So we don’t expect the earth to move overnight.

But it was very gratifying that people were so positive. And you can be sure that others around the world are beginning to make closer or further plans to come to New Zealand. We are planning to make it a wonderful time for you when you come.

Owen

Over & Out

Well, this time next week we will be home! We are so lucky to have had this amazing three month odyssey, but home & hearth are calling. As I write, Owen is out having his last meeting with a choral director at his home which happens to be a boat in Sausalito, across the bay from San Francisco. Choirs AND boats. He will be in heaven. It is another beautiful warm, blue California day here. Read more

Greetings from the USA

We have travelled to many places but it has taken us way too long to make it to the U.S. of A. After two weeks we are feeling right at home, singing our way ‘from Stockbridge to Boston’, via ‘Alice’s Restaurant’ several Woodstocks [but not the real one], spotting the turn-off to Sagamore – this place is inside us already. It was lovely to see a friendly face at JFK & to be whisked up to New Haven, home of Yale with its Oxbridge look-alike buildings & squirrels hopping though the fallen leaves on the square. We had a good rest & became seriously addicted to the US version of ‘The Office’ before picking up a car, more confident thanks to our shiny new satnav but anxious all the same about driving on the wrong side of the road. Read more