Awards at The Big Sing 2018

Every year hundreds of choirs from across New Zealand participate in the highly regarded Big Sing choir festival.

In 2018, Kristin’s two Year 9 to 13 choirs, Euphony (girls) and Boystrous (boys) were among the 72 choirs from throughout the Auckland region to perform at the Auckland Town Hall as part of the New Zealand Choral Federation’s festival. More than 10,000 students in 260 choirs took part in Regional Competitions throughout the country and 24 are chosen to move onto the National Finale to be held in Wellington at the end of August.


Boystrous, a new Kristin choir, was established at the beginning of this year to cater for the increasing number of boys wishing to sing in a choir. Their participation in the Big Sing was a wonderful way to showcase this group under the expert guidance of Giancarlo Lisi. The 35 students involved had worked very hard to develop into a passionate and confident choir.

At the Big Sing prizegiving, Euphony took home two of the top awards: Best Recital by a Female Choir (the 5th time in seven years that Euphony has won this award), and also The Adjudicator's Cup for Best Single Item at the Auckland Regional Festival, for their American folk song Ching-a-Ring Chaw. Congratulations are due to the girls and also their artistic staff, David Squire and Gracie Francis. This success is a huge accomplishment and testament to the talent and commitment of our students and directors. The judges awarded a Distinction award to Euphony, and a Commended award to Boystrous.Both choirs continue to rehearse regularly as they wait to hear if they have been successful in making it through to the National Finale. Additionally, in 2019 Euphony will travel to Europe to perform in Vienna, Prague, Munich and at the Budapest International Choral Festival.

      

Kristin Success at the New Zealand Chamber Music Competition

Chamber Music continues to flourish at Kristin with two groups of Senior School musicians studying under the tutelage of Ms Gracie Francis and preparing for the national Chamber Music competition. Chamber Music involves small ensembles in which there is usually one musician per part, the most well-known format being the string quartet.  

Following weeks of preparation, in mid-June, our two groups: Triple Czech (Year 13 - Alvin Peng, Larissa Chen, Tanya Ren) and Chamber of Secrets (Year 11 - Jacob Siohane-Royle, Vanessa Xiong, Kunli Zhang, Christina Yang) competed in the Auckland round of the New Zealand Chamber Music Competition. This event saw 102 groups of Auckland’s finest young classical musicians performing highly complex and demanding repertoire before a panel of judges.

Following the heats, it was announced that both Kristin groups had been placed in the top 16 and selected for the semi-finals. Both groups played incredibly well in this next round and we were delighted when it was announced that Chamber of Secrets were to progress to the regional finals and the top eight.

Congratulations are due to both groups, but in particular to our Year 11 students who took home three awards from the finals: Best Performance of a New Zealand Composition; the KBB Award for excellence in performance of a work featuring wind or percussion instruments; and Highly Commended, which placed them in the top 5 in the finals. They have also been selected for the next round which sees them competing against the top groups from Auckland, Northland, Bay of Plenty and the Waikato. 

Also in June, Kristin Performing Arts students were given the opportunity to listen to recent Alumni Maisy Smithers, Livy Wicks and Sophie Vincent talking about their experiences auditioning for and studying at some of the world's top Performing Arts schools. Livy and Sophie are currently at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts studying Recorded Music and Acting respectively, while Maisy has recently completed a Musical Theatre programme at Victorian College of the Arts in Melbourne. Maisy will now move to London to study for a degree in Musical Theatre performance at Goldsmiths University. 

 

Snow Sports Success

On Thursday 14 June, the Auckland Secondary Schools Ski and Snowboard Champs were held at Snowplanet, with Kristin athletes walking away with some impressive results.

Boys Snowboard:
Boys Snowboard Team - 1st 

Mitchell Davern - 1st Giant Slalom & Slopestyles
Oliver Whiley - 3rd Giant Slalom
Samuel Finnemore - 3rd Slopestyles

Girls Snowboard:
Juliette Perera - 1st Giant Slalom & Slopestyles

Boys Ski:
Harrison Messenger - 1st Junior Boy Giant Slalom & 1st Overall Junior Boy

Overall Results:
Boys Team - 1st Overall (5th year in a row)

 

Nepal 

Following 18 months of planning and preparation, 39 Kristin students and four staff members travelled to Nepal in April for 19 days of challenge, service and action, and a lifetime of unbelievable memories. This service trip was an amazing welter of experiences, challenges, sights, sounds, tastes and smells as they travelled from Auckland to the warmth of Singapore and eventually to the lofty heights of Annapurna base camp, high in the Himalayas. 

Kristin Service Learning teams collected toothbrushes and sports gear, fundraised for power tools to use in developing the community centres, bought reusable feminine hygiene products, paid for the installation of water filters and solar energy systems (donated by UNICEF and IPN & UNESCO respectively), and laid a concrete floor as part of a wider international schools project to rebuild the quake-damaged villages in the remote mountainous regions of rural Nepal. In Nepal, the students smashed rocks to build retaining walls, installed the solar panel system, conducted vision testing and distributed reading glasses as well as providing water filtration units to every family in the dispersed community they were supporting.

 


Issue 89 July 2018