The Monday Nightingales Choir presents "Curtain Up"

The Monday Nightingales Choir will hold a concert at 3pm on Sunday March 5, 2023. The concert will be held at St. Columba Church which is at the corner of Ocean and Forth Streets, Woollahra.

Doors will be opened at 2.30pm.

“Curtain Up” will be our first concert for more than three years and we are delighted to be performing again after disappointing postponements due to Covid. We will have the most amazing guest singer at this concert. Acclaimed mezzo soprano Jacqueline Dark will be starring. Jacqueline is a Helpmann and Green Room Award winning singer who performs in opera, musical theatre and cabaret.

The Monday Nightingales first sang together in April 2013, and we will be celebrating our tenth anniversary at this concert. Many of the founding choristers had been students at The Music Practice in Surry Hills and wanted to keep singing together after that business closed at the end of 2012. Starting with 12 singers, we now have a choir list of more than seventy with a waiting list for sopranos and altos. The success of the choir has been due to the brilliance of our Musical Director, Tanya Christensen.

Tanya had been a teacher at the Music Practice and many of us had seen her amazing ability to inspire and encourage singers of all levels. From the start, it was decided that this would be a non-audition choir and singers of all levels of experience would be welcomed. We have continued with that philosophy and have a wide range of singing ability in the choir. All are united in a love of singing.

As well as her very extensive teaching career of students of all ages, Tanya is a very talented performer. She is currently a lead vocalist with the Australian Army Band and has served in both Iraq and Afghanistan to entertain the Australian troops there. She has also appeared in a wide variety of productions including musical theatre and opera as well as the Edinburgh Military Tattoo.

As has been our custom in the past, there will be no charge for the concert, but we will be collecting donations for the Australian Children’s Music Foundation, a charity which provides musical instruments and opportunities for underprivileged children in Australia. The foundation runs an extensive programme of musical tuition throughout Australia. The Monday Nightingales choir has supported this charity since 2016 and generous donations from concert attendees have enabled us to give the charity a total of $18,280 over the years. We collect money with help from our pigs Fluffy and Fluffette. At this concert we will also have a ’square’ which enables us to take donations via credit cards.

The Australian Children’s Music Foundation was started in 2002 by Don Spencer, the children's television presenter, singersongwriter, and guitarist. Some might remember Don from Play School where he was a presenter for many years.

The Monday Nightingales choir does not require choristers to audition. Any tenors or basses who are interested in joining us should contact Valerie King at themondaynightingales@gmail.com