Baroque choir sings Handel

Fundraising for a new organ for Mt Maunganui's St Peter's Anglican church starts in earnest this Saturday evening with a special performance by the highly acclaimed Handel Consort and Quire.
It will be the first time the chamber group of 20 voices, based at Auckland's Pitt Street Methodist Church, has agreed to travel away from that city, and will offer a type of music not often heard in the Tauranga area.
The concert is also a tribute to the respect in which St Peter's resident organist, Chalium Poppy, is held by members of Handel Consort following his appearance with the group as bass lead in a recent New Zealand premiere performance of a Handel piece.
"The group is not a normal choir," he says. "The voices are specially trained in baroque music techniques. I told them about our organ project and suggested they might like to travel out of Auckland for a change. And they agreed."
Authenticity will be added to the evening programme with the group being accompanied by instruments contemporary to the music - a harpsichord being loaned by Bethlehem College and played by Chalium, and a viola da gamba (predecessor to the viola) to be played by Polly Sussex.
The main item on the concert's programme will be the oratorio "Jephte" by Giacomo Carissimi taking half the performance.
"Carissimi was almost father of the oratorio - a form that was later made more famous and mainstream by Handel's great oratorios like "Messiah" or "Israel in Egypt"," says Chalium. "An oratorio is simply a musical drama - not unlike an opera - based on a Biblical story. The only real difference between an opera and oratorio is that one is staged, and the other is not."
Travelling with the Consort & Quire will be Jayne Tankersley, a New Zealand soprano of international reputation, who will be singing the role of Jephte's daughter in the oratorio.
The second half of the concert will feature Jayne performing solo works, including Monteverdi's "Laudate Dominum", and solo harpsichord and viola da gamba items.
St Peters hopes to raise $70,000 by Christmas for the fund to replace its 25-year-old "inadequate" organ. The new digital instrument, to be built in Holland, will be the first of its kind in New Zealand, and will emulate the traditional sound of organs in medium-sized parish churches in England.
Saturday's concert, starting at 7.30pm, is the start of the serious campaign, says Rev Marie Gilpin. Tickets ($25) will be available at the door of the church, which has a seating capacity of 200.