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SOUTH
AUSTRALIAN BRANCH |
The South Australian branch was the first branch of The Royal School of Church Music to be formed in Australia around 1944, chaired by Canon Horace Percy (HP) Finnis as "Australian Representative". St Peter's College, Adelaide was the first choir in Australia affiliated to the RSCM in 1931, followed by St Peter's Cathedral, Adelaide, in 1932. The committee is based in Adelaide. Email: sa@rscmaustralia.org.au
BRANCH OFFICERS AND APPOINTED REPRESENTATIVES
Liturgical Commission of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Adelaide (to be appointed) Liturgical Committee of the Anglican Diocese of Adelaide (to be appointed) Liturgy Committee of the South Australian Synod of the Uniting Church of Australia (to be appointed) South Australian Council of Churches (to be appointed) Area Representatives (appointed by the Branch Committee) Northern SA (to be appointed) Southern SA Mr Rick Fisher 14 Victor Sreet Mount Gambier Yorke Peninsula (to be appointed) MEMBERSHIP ENQUIRIES
THE BRANCH NEWSLETTER
THE BRANCH LIBRARY (Grove Memorial Library)
SUMMER SCHOOL TO BE HELD IN ADELAIDE, JANUARY 2010 “Sing my tongue: a journey in faith and song” RSCM AUSTRALIA and RSCM NEW ZEALAND PRESENT THEIR INTERNATIONAL RSCM SUMMER SCHOOL INVITATION TO TAKE PART You may recognize in the theme of the 55th annual Summer School of RSCM, ‘Sing my tongue: a journey in faith and song”, a reference to the opening words of the early medieval hymn, dating back to the sixth century, that sings of the passion and resurrection of Christ. This Australian and New Zealand International Summer School from Sunday 3rd to Sunday 10th January 2010 is an invitation to a pilgrimage of faith and song based on the rhythms and events of Holy Week and Easter. Building on the idea of celebrating every Sunday as an Easter Day, the week will take participants through some of the liturgies associated with the church’s worship during Holy Week and Easter. You will have opportunities to experience some of the oldest and richest liturgies from different traditions of the Christian faith, including a celebration of the Liturgy of the Gifts on Wednesday, Tenebrae on Friday, the Lighting of the Paschal Candle and renewal of baptismal vows on Saturday, culminating in the celebration of the Eucharist on Sunday morning.
The Choral Director of the Adelaide summer school will be Dr Jeffrey Smith, Canon Director of Music at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. Dr Smith comes to us highly recommended by RSCM America, and has had a distinguished career as organist, conductor and educationist. He holds degrees from Yale University and the Royal College of Music, London. His teachers included Gerre Hancock, David Willcocks and Philippe Lefebvre, organist of Notre Dame de Paris, and he has undertaken a special study of the German boys’ choir tradition. Jeffrey Smith has been Organist and Choirmaster at Christ Church Cathedral in Lexington, Kentucky, before moving in 1992 to St Paul’s Church, Washington DC. There he appeared regularly as conductor at the Kennedy Centre for the Performing Arts and with the National Symphony Orchestra. In 2004 he accepted the post at Grace Cathedral. He was awarded the Fellowship of the RSCM at a ceremony in York Minster in June 2004. Dr Smith is married to Elisabeth Braw, a Swedish journalist, and has two children. Principal Organist We are delighted to announce that Siegfried Francke has accepted the position of Principal Organist and Accompanist for the Summer School to be held in Adelaide from 3rd to 10th January 2010. Siegfried is Parish Organist of Christ Church South Yarra in Melbourne, Victoria; sub-organist of St Paul’s Cathedral and teaches music at Trinity Grammar School. He studied organ with June Nixon and with Richard Popplewell in London. He is an Associate of the Royal College of Organists and a Fellow of the Trinity College of Music. He is much sought after as an accompanist and has built a high profile as organ recitalist. Recent engagements have been with the Tudor Choristers, the Royal Melbourne Philharmonic Choir and the Geelong Chorale. He has long been involved in RSCM festivals and is currently on the executive of RSCM Victoria. Director of the Youth Course We are also very pleased to welcome Tom Healey as the Director of the Youth Course associated with the Summer School. Tom is Director of Music at St Andrew’s Church in Brighton, Victoria, where he has been working with adult and youth choirs since August 2006. He was previously on the staff of Geelong Grammar School for many years, where he headed up the music program and was Director of Chapel Music. He studied choral conducting at the University of Melbourne and at the Westminster Choir College, Princeton, and has a wealth of experience working with young people and with adult choirs. He has directed youth choirs at RSCM Festivals and the 2006 Summer School.
An exciting repertoire of music has been chosen for the Summer School, with music from the medieval period to the twenty-first century selected. Music will range from the exhilaration of one of Mozart’s early choral masses, the Missa in honorem Sanctissimae Trinitatis KV 167, to recently composed music for less experienced choirs and congregations to sing. There will be a number of works by Australian and New Zealand composers, including Malcolm Williamson, Colin Brumby, Becky Llewelyn, Jenny McLeod and David Childs, as well as recent music from the United States of America. We will also celebrate two composers whose anniversaries fall in 2010: Samuel Sebastian Wesley and Andrea Gabrieli (although recent research suggests that we may be a little premature here!). A full complement of workshops for organists, choral conductors and choristers at all levels of experience will be an integral part of the program, including a master class for advanced organ students and performers with Dr Jeffrey Smith. There will be workshops for the RSCM program “Voice for Life”, a carefully planned framework for choral singers to develop their vocal skills and musical understanding. A range of elective workshops will also be available. As part of the program all participants will be given a “day off” singing so that they may enjoy the manifold pleasures of an expedition to the Barossa Valley. There will be opportunities to hear some of the beautiful and historic organs to be found in the valley and take in some of the ambient sights and sounds of the region. On Thursday evening the Summer School dinner will be held in the grounds of Adelaide’s historic South Australian Cricket Oval. But the core of the Summer School will be, as always, the joy of learning and rehearsing new and old compositions, and then singing this music in the contexts of some of the most theologically profound, and dramatic liturgies of the Christian church.
The Summer School will be conducted in the churches of North Adelaide and the centre of the city, including St Peter’s Cathedral, Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Brougham Place Uniting Church, North Adelaide Baptist Church and Pilgrim Church in the city. Interstate and overseas participants will be able to stay at St Mark’s College in North Adelaide. The Organising Committee is keen to encourage younger choristers to attend the Summer School and will be offering a substantially discounted registration fee to participants 21 years of age or younger. We would like to welcome families to the Summer School. Some of the accommodation at St Mark’s College is suitable for family groups, and limited accommodation is available in North Adelaide in apartments and motels. The nearest tourist park accommodation is approximately 1.5 k from North Adelaide, by public transport.
Registrations for the Summer School are now open. Early bird registration is available until 30th November 2009; thereafter standard registration fees apply. The Youth Course or youth concession registration fees are discounted for participants who are full time students under the age of 22 years on 3 January 2010. Download the application form: Word version / PDF version Email: SS10@rscmaustralia.org.au Postal address: Dr Warren Bourne |
