Two choirs, Dannevirke's Viking Choir and Woodville's Stand Up and Sing community choir, combined for a concert filled with classics, new works and Christmas songs. Photo / Leanne Warr
Two choirs, Dannevirke's Viking Choir and Woodville's Stand Up and Sing community choir, combined for a concert filled with classics, new works and Christmas songs. Photo / Leanne Warr
There were a few understandable nerves as two choirs came together for the first time in performance.
It was the first time the two choirs had performed together. Photo / Leanne Warr
But months of rehearsals paid off for Dannevirke’s Viking Choir and Woodville’s Stand Up and Sing community choir when they performed a concert in Dannevirke at the weekend.
When they were joined by singers from Totara College, St John’s Anglican church was filled with the sound of 60 voices singing together.
Stand Up and Sing community choir musical director Vicky Tomlinson was “over the moon” with how the night went.
Around 80 people attended the concert, which is the first of two, with the second to be held at the Holy Trinity Anglican Church in Woodville on December 2.
Songs by Stand Up and Sing community choir included those from stage shows or films. Photo / Leanne Warr
The Viking Choir sang favourites including Don McLean’s American Pie. Photo / Leanne Warr
The men of the Stand Up and Sing community choir sang Wellerman. Photo / Leanne Warr
The programme included some old favourites such as music from stage shows or movies, classics such as Amazing Grace and American Pie and even a song that has been building up a following on social media as a sea shanty.
Wellerman, also known as Soon May the Wellerman Come, according to a Google search, is a folk song first published in New Zealand in the 1970s. While there is some uncertainty as to its true origin, it is essentially a ballad about a whaling ship.
Its rhythms, as well as the deep voices of the men singing, provide the best kind of toe-tapping enjoyment for the audience.
Students from Totara College also performed songs such as She’ll Be Right and Cheeky Little Fantail, but it was the combined rendition of Lion Sleeps Tonight that got a few audience members singing along.
Piripi Whaanga performing his song with the three choirs - Viking Choir, Stand Up and Sing community choir and Totara College. Photo / Leanne Warr
One of the highlights of the night was a debut performance of a song about community.
Lyn Falconer leads the Viking Choir. Photo / Leanne Warr
Piripi Whaanga’s composition, Te Waka Rongopai, was put to a score by Viking Choir musical director Lyn Falconer.
Piripi took the lead in the song, which he says is a powhiri of challenge to be carriers of peace.
“It’s a Kiwi song,” he says.
Written as a gospel piece, the lyrics are in te reo Māori, but the audience doesn’t need to understand the words to feel the power in them.
Piripi says it’s a song the whole community can participate in and one he hopes will bridge troubled waters.
In the programme for the concert, the interpretation says the song “invites a community response to the good news that we all are called to be peace-brokers. This is a heart response that all Kiwis can practice to bring harmony to a fractured world.”
The song will be performed again at the Woodville concert.
The audience was also encouraged to join in during a challenge, where the choirs were split into three groups, each singing a snippet from songs, with participants spurred on to sing louder with each round.
The night ended with Christmas carols where once again the audience was encouraged to take part, and they did so, their voices joining the combined choir in classics such as Silent Night, Come All Ye Faithful and Te Harinui.
