Gala Concert Programme

Manly Warringah Choir  50th Anniversary Gala Concert
The Waterford Hall, St Paul’s College, Manly,  Sunday August 17th 2025 at 2.00pm
Click here to book tickets (Booking opens on July 7th)

Programme
Zadok the Priest from Handel’s Coronation Anthems.
How lovely are thy dwellings fair from Brahms’ German Requiem
Introit and Kyrie from Mozart’s Requiem
Et incarnatus est from Mozart’s Mass in C minor
The Lark Ascending by R Vaughan Williams (solo violin Alex Norton)

Interval

Glory be to God from Bach’s Christmas Oratorio
Exceeding glad shall we be from Handel’s Coronation Anthems
And the glory of the Lord from Handel’s Messiah
For unto us a child is born from Handel’s Messiah
Porgy and Bess – a medley by George and Ira Gershwin
Prende la vela by Carlos Alvarado

The Committee decided that a concert featuring highlights of our choral repertoire would be the focus of our celebration.  In December 2024 Choir members were invited to submit their nominations of works that they would like included in this concert.  Forty three people responded, nominating 30 works by 20 composers.  Analysing the findings of this survey was a particularly pleasant task because so many of those who responded noted their thanks for the opportunity to submit their views.  Click here to see the full findings.
The ’winning composers were Jenkins, Brahms, Handel,  Mozart and Faure.  Carlos and the Committee then considered a range of practical issues such as resources, orchestration, music availability and others and came up with a program based on the Choir’s views and those considerations.  Its elements are:
  • Handel is featuring strongly with the concert opening with that rousing ‘Zadok the Priest’
  • Mozart also appears a couple of times with movements from his ‘Requiem’.
  • The middle movement from Brahms ‘German Requiem’ is always a treat to sing.
  • Bach comes a little lower in the voting list but Carlos decreed that a celebration concert must feature Bach.
  • For something a bit more modern we include a medley from ‘Porgy and Bess’, also featured in your vote.
  • No Faure music is included but we sang a lot of Faure in a recent concert.
  • We could not include anything from ’The Armed Man’ because royalties to do so would be prohibitingly expensive. His ‘Stella Natalis’ is the main feature of the December concert.
  • To honour our dedicated and inspiriting Musical Director we will sing ‘Prende la Vela his arrangement to a catchy South American tune.
  • For an instrumental piece we include Vaughan Williams’ ’The Lark Ascending’ in memory of Carlos late violinist wife, Alexandra who played it in a concert ten years ago and so moved  audience and choir alike.