Choral music fans have been waiting with bated breath for this year's Taipei International Choral Festival and it's finally here with a diverse lineup of singing groups ready to treat us to unique sounds from far and wide.
Starting Sunday, the sixth annual festival will cover classical, folk and popular choral music with groups from Finland, Denmark, Indonesia and Turkey, as well as some local groups, and will tour the island, making it as far south as Jiayi (嘉義). Each group will hold one performance in Taipei and one in a different city.
The festival's first Taipei concert is Finland's six-member acapella choral group Rajaton this Sunday at the National Concert Hall. Rajaton means boundless, and they make it a point to be so with a repertoire ranging from sacred music to pop, folk and contemporary concert music. The group's music is all written or arranged especially for them, and is often Finnish poetry put to music or new versions of old Finnish folk songs.
PHOTO COURTESY OF TAIPEI PHILHARMONIC FOUNDATIONN
"We choose our songs very carefully, whether it's a question of traditional choral music or contemporary pop. We want to entertain but there also has to be substance for entertainment. The songs we sing always have to mean something to ourselves," Rajaton member Jussi Chydenius said.
Rajaton will be joined on Sunday by the Nantou County Xinxiang Elementary Bunun Aboriginal Choir.
The Parahyangan Catholic University (Unpar) Choir follows hot on Rajaton's heels with a performance Monday night. Under the leadership of Indonesia's foremost choral director Avip Priatna, Unpar Choir strives to bring a new perspective to classical music, making it accessible. The Unpar Choir will be joined on Monday by the Taipei Male Choir.
PHOTO COURTESY OF TAIPEI PHILHARMONIC FOUNDATIONN
The third evening of choral music will feature an elementary/secondary school chorus competition. Several school choruses from Taipei (and one from Kaohsiung) will sing their hearts out for top honors, and Taipei Chenggong Children's Chorus and Turkey's Orfeon Chamber Choir will deliver performances to cheer them on.
Orfeon Chamber Choir, which will be the main act of Wednesday night's concert, was established in 1994 to bring choral music from all over the world to Turkey and vice versa. Since then, the group has been busy at home and abroad with international concerts and competitions as well as charity performances. Their repertoire reaches back to the early history of European choral music with songs from as long ago as the Middle Ages.
The festival lineup revisits northern Europe with a concert by Danish group Vocal Line on Friday, July 22. This concert could take you back to your college days of watching student groups sing acapella arrangements of pop and rock classics.
The 30-member acapella choir was created to be a major force in the development of contemporary music in Denmark as well as the world. Their Web site describes their style as "a mixture of pop, rock, jazz, world, and classical avant garde."
The Winnipeg Singers, a traditional choir tracing its origins back to the 1930s, will be performing a mixture of sacred and secular choral music on Saturday, July 23. The group is regularly heard on Canada's CBC radio and commission works by Canadian composers each year.
Tickets range from NT$300 to NT$1,500 and can be purchased in sets at a discount. For tour locations and samples of each group's music visit www.tpf.org.tw/2005festival. Tickets are available through Artsticket: (02) 3393 9888 or www.artsticket.com.tw. The National Concert Hall is located at 21-1 Zhongshan S Rd, Taipei
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