Its Showtime-Celebrate With Song with the Zemel Choir

April 18, 2010 - PRLog -- The ever-popular Celebrate With Song is here again, bringing mixed-voice Jewish choral music to new singers and new audiences. In the past four years we have sung plainchant, Baroque cantatas, swinging American tunes and some of the best in British Jewish music. We have had voice coaching from some of the UK’s leading practitioners. So what do we have this year? Well, pick up your music folders, dust down those vocal cords and get ready for something entertaining. It’s showtime. This year we are singing music by Jewish composers written for the stage – from opera to operetta, Yiddish theatre to musicals. We have music by some of the classics – Gerhswin, Weill and friends – and Yiddish theatre numbers such as Sheyn Vi Di Levoneh and Rozhinkes Mit Mandlen. We have a lecture from one of the leading experts on Yiddish theatre, and voice coaching from one of the West End’s leading voice coaches. And this year we are also running youth workshops for singers aged 18 and under, led by one of the UK’s up-and-coming youth choir specialists. Do you like singing? Do you like listening? Are you ready to be entertained? Celebrate With Song 2010. May 23rd and June 6th 2010.

This event will take place at JFS in North London on two Sundays, 23rd May and 6th June 2010. It is open to participants with differing levels of singing experience and for the first time this year will include a Youth workshop.  Details are as follows:

Adult Workshops
This year there will be a single specially formed workshop group, and this will participate in workshop rehearsals on both the 23rd May and 6th of June. The group will perform repertoire of varied standard, and so will be open both to people with limited experience of choral singing and music theory, and who do not feel confident about reading music or sight-singing, and also to those who have significant experience of singing with amateur choirs.

Celebrate With Song Workshop with Vocal Coach in 2009

The group will learn several pieces covering this year’s theme which is Music from the Theatre.  The aim is to give a flavour of the range of choral music by Jewish composers.  The group will perform the music that they learn at the evening concert on Sunday 6th June.  The Workshop Leader will be Benjamin Wolf, Musical Director of The Zemel Choir.

Youth Workshops
There will be a one day youth session for those of secondary school age, on 6th June led by Simona Budd.  The group will learn two pieces of music to perform at the evening concert, plus a further two to be performed as part of the massed choir, joining with the Adult workshop participants.

Voice Production Workshop
Both Adult and Youth workshop attendees will participate in a Voice Production Workshop on the 6th June, led by Mary Hammond, the well known vocal coach and judge for the BBC’s Voice of Musical Theatre and Choir of the Year.


Sunday 6th June 2010 Adults and Youth
Venue: JFS
In the morning, there will be further workshop for the Group (working on the music that was learnt the previous week).  Following the Voice Production Workshop in the afternoon, there will be brief rehearsals in the concert venue, followed by a public concert (entry by pre-booked ticket only).  The concert will include performance by The Zemel Choir, Alyth Youth Choir, the Yavneh College Choir, and the workshop groups.


Registration and Refreshments
The registration fee for the adult workshops is £45.00, which includes entry to the evening concert.  £40.00 if booked before 30th April.   These prices include scores, though some of the music we will be using will be hired and must be returned after the concert.

There is no charge for the Youth Workshops thanks to the generosity of The Ernest Cook Trust.  Entry to the venue on both workshop days will be by security pass, which must be shown at the main gate.  The pass will be issued by email (or post if no email address) with your booking confirmation.

Workshop attendees are asked to bring lunch with them on both days as the nearest shops/cafes are some distance from the school. On 6th June, attendees are advised to bring food for later, too.  Cold drinks will be provided during the breaks.

Concert Tickets
Tickets will be available from The Zemel Choir in advance of the concert but no tickets will be sold on the door. Tickets may be purchased now by e-mailing celebratewithsong@zemelchoir.org Workshop participants will be entitled to order tickets for family and friends at the concessionary price of £10.00 (full price £12.00).  Please note that admission to the concert is by pre-booked ticket only.

CWS Workshop Leaders – Brief Biographies
Benjamin Wolf is Musical Director of the Zemel Choir. He has performed with the choir at major London venues, on tour in Europe and for the BBC. He regularly conducts a number of other choirs in and around London, as well as composing music for theatre and the concert hall. As a pianist he performs in both the UK and abroad. As an orchestral conductor he has performed for the BBC Proms, as well as conducting the Wallace Ensemble - a young, professional chamber orchestra.

Mary Hammond.  Following her training at the Royal Academy of Music in both singing and piano, Mary Hammond spent twenty five years as a singer with an almost unique range of styles, from opera at Covent Garden to stadium gigs with groups including Black Sabbath, Pink Floyd and Roxy Music. She also worked and recorded extensively for TV and radio (film scores, TV series, live broadcasts, BBC Big Band, Top of the Pops, Jingles etc..,) and now television companies and record producers frequently use her as a vocal trouble-shooter and singing consultant.

She enjoys using her experience in the pop industry to teach up-and-coming young bands alongside a diverse mix of international chart-topping artists. Recently Mary has worked with Coldplay, Dido, Kaiser Chiefs, Katherine Jenkins and The Saturdays.

Mary currently works on Billy Elliot the Musical, Phantom of the Opera, Joseph, Cabaret and Funny Girl. She worked with Gerry Butler on the title role in the film version of Phantom of the Opera, and has worked as vocal coach and advisor with the first casts of at least 26 West End shows including Les Miserables, Cats, Jesus Christ Superstar, Mamma Mia, Rent, Billy Eliot and La Cage aux Folles. She has also worked on several productions at the National Theatre including A Little Night Music and Sweeny Todd, as well as productions with the Royal Shakespeare Company, the Donmar Warehouse, Chichester Festival and many repertory theatres.

Simona Budd works at the London School of Musical Theatre and Trinity College of Music Junior Department.  She is a performance and repertoire coach on the musical theatre course at the Tring Park School for the Performing Arts and gives vocal and musical theatre workshops with various choirs and drama organisations.  She has recently started working with the New London Children’s Choir as one of their supporting conductors.

Barry Davis is a writer on Jewish History, actor and expert in Yiddish and the Yiddish Theatre.  He regularly works for Jewish organisations in the UK, including the Jewish Music Institute and the Spiro Ark.

Addresses and contact details
Contacts: For further information or to enrol for the workshops

Tel: 020 8236 0317 (evenings)

or email: celebratewithsong@zemelchoir.org

For concert ticket information: 020 8906 1318

JFS
The Mall
Kenton, Middlesex
HA3 9TE

Celebrate with Song is a venture by The Zemel Choir in partnership with The Spiro Ark Institute.  The Ernest Cook Trust has generously supported the Youth Workshops.

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The Zemel Choir, under the musical direction of Benjamin Wolf, is proud of its international reputation as one of the world’s finest mixed voice Jewish choirs. Zemel's repertoire embraces all the traditional Jewish cultures