22 Issue 54 – October 2015 – QUEEN MARGARET CALLING
The talented group of singers won the award after performing
Gabriel Faure’s Cantique de Jean Racine at the Regional
Secondary School Singing Competition.
Held at the Michael Fowler Centre over two days, the Big
Sing attracted a high standard of entries from schools within the
Wellington region.
Chorale Captain Olivia Kelly says the group was thrilled to be
recognised for all their hard work.
“We are all stoked to get the award and I think the choir definitely
deserves it.”
All competing choirs had to sing a New Zealand composition
(which may include a Maori or Pasifika song), a classical song and
an own-choice song, with a Romantic Song as a subcategory of the
compulsory Classical song.
The Romantic Song is Western classical music that began in the
late 18th or early 19th century.
Olivia says the song itself was not difficult to learn but they
struggled more with the pronunciation because it was entirely
The Queen Margaret College Chorale won the award for Best Performance of a Romantic Song
at this year’s Big Sing.
Big Hit at Big Sing
French.
But with Director Louise Logan and help from French teacher
Caroline Harding, the girls blew the audience away.
“In the end, after spending all that time working on getting the
language right we were able to have a more unified sound,” Olivia
says.
The twenty-eight students who make up the Chorale range from
Year 9 to 13 and they practise together at least once a week.
A member of Chorale since coming to the College, Olivia enjoys
singing as part of a team.
“I’ve learnt after all my time singing in choirs that it really is all
about working together.”
The girls have performed throughout the year at the Wadestown
Presbyterian Church Hall, the Sarah Lilli Family Concert, Old St
Paul’s Lunchtime Concerts and most recently joined forces with
Scots College to perform at their end of year Scots’ Spectacular and
our own Arts Extravaganza (as pictured below).