Sing with us in 2025

You are welcome to come along to any of our rehearsals at 7-9pm on  Monday nights at Newlands Christian Assembly, 126 Newlands Road, Newlands, Wellington

• We sing traditional and new choral repertoire.
• As a new member of the choir in 2025 you will learn a wide variety of sacred and secular music in many different styles and expand your musical horizons.
• We usually perform three concerts each year, and most concerts are recorded, so members can buy mp3 files to keep as a personal reminder.

We rehearse on Monday nights at 7-9pm from February to early December at Newlands Christian Assembly, 126 Newlands Road, Newlands, Wellington.

• This is a central location for people in the wider Wellington metro area.
• There is plenty of free parking at the church and car pools operate from several areas.
• You can also use public transport as the venue is on the Newlands bus route with a stop outside the church.
• The church is a warm and comfortable venue.

We are a professionally led choir.

• Our Musical Director is Ingrid Schoenfeld, who is also  a talented concert pianist and music teacher. We have sung many successful concerts under her leadership.
• Our accompanist and deputy director is Dr Jonathan Berkahn, who is a is a skilled conductor, organist, composer of attractive singable music and a music teacher.

Our joining process is easy. No formal audition is required.

• Come to 3 rehearsals without obligation to try us out.
• Then book an informal voice review with the Musical Director. This is not an audition. At the review you will present a song of your choice and sing some scales to find your vocal range. The Musical Director will talk to you about note reading, learning repertoire, time commitment, your musical background and give you feedback on your singing.
• Our Chairperson will also talk to you about the choir’s ethos and approach.
• If you are unable to attend a rehearsal, we request that you text in an apology. This ensures that we maintain the caring quality our choir is known for.

Festival Singers is an affordable choir.

• Our annual membership subscriptions for 2025 are $300 for adults and $275 for adult members in the same household.
• Full time students pay just $125 for a full year.
• Members can pay subscriptions in instalments by arrangement with the Treasurer.
• To keep these rates low, we have at least one fundraiser a year which is easy to sell to our supporters, such as a Lighthouse Film evening.

We currently have 28 members and would love to increase this in 2025.

• Festival Singers was founded in 1976 to promote new forms of Christian music and, as a well-established choir with a mix of long-time and newer members, has evolved into a greater Wellington community-focused choir.
• Each year we support a good cause by taking a donation / koha at our Christmas concert.
• We also collaborate with other choirs and musical groups (St Mary of the Angels Six, Capital Choir in 2024) from time to time.

Many choir members are Christian and the music we sing often lets them express their faith.

• All ages and those of all faiths, or none, are welcome.
• We would love you to become part of Festival Singers’ tradition.

We know you will make new friends in our supportive community choir.

If you have any further questions, please contact:

• Ingrid Schoenfeld (Musical Director) Ingrid Schoenfeld ingrid.s@outlook.co.nz, mobile 027 240 6669 or
  

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• Philip Garside (Secretary) books@pgpl.co.nz

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Documentary Video about making the recording of A Hopkins Gloria

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Composer’s note:

A Hopkins Gloria was initially premiered at a concert that included two other Glorias, by Vivaldi and by John Rutter. In the back of my mind were Classical and Baroque “cantata-masses” like Vivaldi’s Gloria, where each fragment of the (Latin) text is spun out into a complete movement. I was tempted in this direction, but decided at length to set the text in English (mostly the version in A New Zealand Prayer Book) – partly because most of the rest of the concert was in Latin. And as soon as I had made that decision, I felt that I couldn’t repeat each clause indefinitely, treating them as tokens to fill out abstract musical designs, but had to regard the text (or at least larger sections of it) as meaningful wholes.

Then I had an idea. Gerard Manley Hopkins’ Pied Beauty (“Glory be to God for dappled things…”) came into my head, which I had attempted without success to set at various times over the last twenty-five years. I thought of ‘inhabiting’ this canonical text with other, related texts (“and the birds of the air shall make their homes in its branches…”). It occurred to me that one of Hopkins’ Terrible Sonnets, written out of his blackest depression, could make a useful counterpoint to the Agnus Dei sections; then I wondered if the second half of his “That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of the comfort of the Resurrection” might work as a way of bringing about a return to the joyful mood of the whole.

So there is a kind of spiritual drama, a dark night of the soul, at the heart of the piece. And it may be worth saying that the emotional dynamic of this section – the attempt to soothe and manage dark imaginings in the early hours of the morning by repetition of the Agnus Dei prayer – is, quite literally, something that has been a regular part of my spiritual life. I do believe, somehow, that joy will have the final word; but suffering and resurrection have to happen first.

Our Musical Director

We welcomed Ingrid Schoenfeld as our Musical Director in 2019.

Ingrid Schoenfeld is a classical pianist and accomplished teacher. She completed her Bachelor of Music in Classical Performance with first-class Honours at the New Zealand School of Music.

She has learned primarily from Richard Mapp as well as Dr. Jian Liu, and has played in masterclasses for Diedre Irons, Janos Cegledy, Paul Rickard-Ford, Natalia Sheludiakova, and the New Zealand String Quartet, among others. In addition to piano, she also studied harpsichord for three years under prominent early music specialists Dr Erin Helyard and Douglas Mews.

She made her orchestral debut in 2016 with the Nelson Symphony Orchestra, playing Shostakovich’s 2nd piano concerto.

Ingrid studied conducting at the New Zealand School of Music under Kenneth Young, and has conducted and accompanied multiple choirs around Wellington, including the Northern Chorale, St. James church choir, and the St. Mary of the Angels Youth Choir.

She sang with the St. Mary of the Angels church choir for two years, was a reserve member in the New Zealand Youth Choir, and currently sings in the Wellington Cathedral Choir under Michael Stewart.

In addition to performing regularly in solo, chamber, and choral concerts, she runs a successful teaching studio.

We have sung many successful concerts under her leadership.

Ingrid was Festival Singer’s Accompanist from the start of 2018 to mid-2019.

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Video interviews with choir members

Click the images to run the videos

Here’s a short interview with Megan about being part of Festival Singers.

Here’s a short interview with Joe about being part of Festival Singers and one of his recent concert highlights. Our contact details are at the end of the video.

Diana, who has been a member of the choir since 1982, talks with Philip about why Festival Singers is special for her.

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The choir is registered under the Charities Act 2005.
Donations made to the choir are tax-deductible in New Zealand.