Women’s voices take centre stage for Easter

MUSIC at the Basilica’s Easter Concert at St Mary of the Angels next month will celebrate of the female voice.

“The whole program is based around music that’s been specifically written for the higher voices,” Music at the Basilica secretary, Jane Bashiruddin, said.

The women of Windfire Choir and Vox Angelica Geelong Chamber Choir conducted by Tom Healey, alongside a series of solo artists, will perform at the concert on 29 April.

“The concert is organised in two parts: it’s like coming out of the shadows into the light,” Bashiruddin said.

“That represents going through the period of Lent and emerging at the other end through to Easter, which is a celebration of the victory over death.”

“The first half of the program is quite solemn and sombre,” she said, “and towards the end it goes into very joyous music.”

The performance will also feature an original composition by local composer Michael Hannan.

Based on a poem by Rosemary Blake, the piece has been commissioned by Music at the Basilica and will premiere at the concert.

For Winchelsea soprano Zinaida Campion, the Basilica has long been a treasured performance venue.

Campion joined the Basilica as a scholar at 18, and said the “terrifically grand historic space is very inspiring, I feel like [the basilica] is one of my musical homes.”

As a child, Campion grew up in a home of classical music lovers and was “heavily influenced by the career and life of Marjorie Lawrence, a legendary soprano,” she said.

Lawrence, who also grew up near Winchelsea, was one of Australia’s most notable sopranos of the 20th century.

Campion will sing Vivaldi’s Nulla in mundo pax sincera, which she is excited to perform for the first time.

“It’s magnificently varied and colourful… the four movements of that piece are all extremely different, so it’s highly varied and requires a lot of attention,” she said.

Bashiruddin said audiences can also expect solo and group performances, including the use of the Basilica’s organs.

“It is a concert where the full range of women’s voices will be on display,” she said. “We hope people go home feeling just a little bit uplifted and a little bit hopeful.”

For tickets, head to trybooking.com/DIJNV