RUBY ANNIVERSARY
CONCERT SERIES
Yes, 2025 marks our 40th anniversary, and we’d love you to celebrate it with us! Please join us on 19 October for:
TWOSCORE YEARS
AND PLENTY
Sunday, 19 October at 5pm
Auckland Town Hall, Concert Chamber
They say life begins at 40. If so, our ‘gestation’ has been nothing if not hectic, with more than 500 concerts, events, broadcasts and recordings since our conception!
Yet what a time we’ve had! Our 20th anniversary programme was ‘Keeping the Score’, so we’ve decided to double down (up?) on that theme and reflect on the wealth of music, abundant opportunities and generous audiences we’ve been blessed with over these four decades.
Therefore, we would love you to come and celebrate with us our…
TWOSCORE YEARS AND PLENTY
Sunday 19 October, 5pm
Auckland Town Hall Concert Chamber
This won’t just be a greatest hits concert. Instead, we’ll revisit some of the many ‘choral doors’ Viva Voce has opened and often walked through: genres like madrigal, motet, folk, spiritual and pop; styles from serious and dramatic to light and humorous; and composers such as Monteverdi, Purcell, Debussy, Britten, Vaughan Williams, Whitacre, Hamilton and Ritchie, to name but a few.
We won’t spoil all the birthday surprise/s, but most of the above will appear, intermingled with a couple of brand-new delights. Follow our social pages for fun updates!
We can’t wait to celebrate twoscore years of joyful, adventurous music-making with you!
Memories…
listen
We are VIVA VOCE
Founded in 1985, VIVA VOCE is an auditioned chamber choir that specialises in the innovative programming and attractive presentation of a huge variety of music, striving always for both excellence and entertainment. The choir has now given over 400 concerts throughout New Zealand and in 2018 was invited to sing in the China International Chorus Festival in Beijing. Viva Voce is often broadcast on Radio New Zealand and is regularly engaged for choral-orchestral collaborations, while its own semi-staged productions of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, Carissimi’s Jephte, Handel’s Solomon and Messiah and Talbot’s Path of Miracles have received critical acclaim.
JOHN ROSSER is the choir’s founder and Musical Director. He was also New Zealand Opera Chorus Master for 23 years and is Immediate Past Chair of the New Zealand Choral Federation, of which he was made a life member in 2018. National Director of both The Big Sing and Sing Aotearoa, John led the NZCF Anthems Project for the 2011 Rugby World Cup. He was Artistic Director of the World Symposium on Choral Music 2020 and will head up New Zealand’s hosting of the 2024 World Choir Games in Auckland.
