Ayr Choral Union

Come and Try St John Passion with Ayr Choral and Andy McTaggart.

Join us as we start learning this magnificent piece, ahead of our concert in April, at Castlehill Church in Ayr on Saturday 8th January from 1pm – 3pm. Whether you are thinking of joining the choir or just fancy a bit of singing – come and give us a try! Distancing and sanitisation measures will be in place but if you have any questions ahead of the day, contact us at ayrchoral@outlook.com.

Our nominated charity for the 2022-23 season is Ayrshire Hospice.

Christmas with Ayr Choral 2021  

Sunday 12^th December 7.30pm  

Venue: Ayr Town Hall, New Bridge Street, Ayr KA7 1JX  

On the programme this year Ayr Choral will perform the joyful and heavenly piece Vom Himmel Hoch (From heaven above to earth I come) by Felix Mendelssohn. The choir rehearsed this piece last year online and look forward to performing it live this year. Included in the wide variety of Christmas music will be the beautiful O Magnum Mysterium by Morten Lauridsen and the Ceremony of Carols, with harp accompaniment, by Benjamin Britten. The joyfulness will continue with lots of your traditional Christmas favourites.  

Ayr Choral’s fabulous conductor Andrew McTaggart kept the choir goingthroughout lockdown with fun and vigour using the wonders of online technology. However, Christmas will be very special as we will be singing live with a real audience.  

Andrew will be assisted by Nils Meier our Assistant Conductor.  

The soloists will be Soprano Charlie Drummond, former Scottish Opera Emerging Artist and graduate of the London Opera Studio, and Baritone Christopher Nairne, soloist and ensemble member at Opera North. Piano and organ accompanist will be Andrew Forbes, Director of Music at Glasgow Cathedral.  

Tickets are available from members of Ayr Choral, the Gaiety Box Office, and online at www.ayrchoralunion.net.   

Welcome back to all our members, friends and anyone who would like to join our return to live rehearsals in Castlehill Church in Ayr on Tuesday 31st August!  We will be getting our voices back into choir mode and learning some sparkling music. If you would like to join the choir or check us out, please contact our Secretary at ayrchoral@outlook.com for further information.

It is important though to read our guidance for members before turning up on a Tuesday night.

We are getting ready to welcome members and guests to our next online offering of singing fun “Broadway and Back again” in May. Read our Presidents newsletter for more details.

If you want more information about the current guidelines for choral singing safely please visit the site below. Bear in mind it refers to the current situation in England . Choir members may want to read this before completing your questionnaire

https://www.abcd.org.uk/Resources/COVID-19

To end a highly successful Season with a range of choral adventures on Zoom, Ayr Choral are planning to be in laid back mode for our May project – exploring a range of popular choral music appropriate for Spring and recovery. 

There are four sessions on Tuesday evenings in May for anyone who would like to Zoom in and join us for some relaxed “sing along” familiar music based on four themes:  Stage, Screen, Opera and Scotland. Music will include excerpts from Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves, Chilcott’s Like a Singing Bird, a touch of Gershwin, a dip into West Side Story and back via Carousel and Lord of the Rings. This musical miscellany will round off our 2020-21 Season on a high note!

For further information see www.ayrchoralunion.net or Facebook @ayrchoralunion.  Cost is £15 for the four sessions, and booking can be done online by emailing ayrchoral@outlook.com

Sunday 28th March 2021

Link to JustGiving page

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/paul-wilson-968?utm_term=P5rP5yZMQ

Ayr Choral Online – Spring 2021

Following on from Ayr Choral Union’s extremely successful online Messiah, highlighted by Keith Bruce in the Herald magazine, in January we will start to rehearse for our Choral Masterworks Concert. We’ll be singing ten Choral favourites, classical and contemporary, and the list will definitely contain at least one of everyone’s ”Desert Island Discs” with music by Bach, Verdi and Mozart as well as Gjeilo, Lauridsen and MacMillan.

Our exceptional soloists, Catriona Hewitson, Penelope Cousland, Ted Black and Colin Murray will again be joining Andrew McTaggart to sing us through Zoom rehearsals, with Andrew Forbes as accompanist. As well as laying down backing tracks, they will be adding some coaching on the Tuesday evening Zoom sessions. To add to the excitement we will have some very special guests popping in!
There will still be many hoops to jump through before big choirs are fully back in live action, so we are delighted to continue to welcome not only our own members whose response to Online singing has been magnificent, but also singers from all parts of Scotland and beyond! There will be 12 rehearsals beginning on Tuesday 12th January at 7:30pm. To book a singing place or get more information, contact ayrchoral@outlook.com or check us out on www.ayrchoralunion.net or @ayrchoralunion on Facebook.Everyone who has taken part in our Zoom rehearsals has felt the physical and psychological benefits of the sessions. Let’s keep singing!

Dear Singer,

Thank you for your contribution to last evening’s performance.

We may have been singing in isolation but I am sure you will have been thrilled at the outcome. We had 150 people in the Zoom room. We had friends and family join us for the occasion. We had the most wonderful soloists and orchestra and  we had the Mastermind behind it Andrew McTaggart.

The donations page has registered over £1500  for Help Musicians Scotland and to top it all there is a review which will fill you with pride.

We need good news at this time and I hope that you find this uplifting.

Click on the link below to read this fantastic review.