The Learners Chorus - 30th Anniversary Concert
Mahler's Symphony No. 8 ("Symphony of a Thousand")
In celebration of its 30th anniversary, the Learners Chorus is hosting a performance of Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 8 on 27 September 2009 (Sunday), at 8:00pm at the Hong Kong Cultural Centre Concert Hall, under the baton of its Music Director, Mr Apollo Wong, with guest performers from:
* the Friends of Learners Orchestra,
* the Hong Kong Children's Choir,
* the Christian Choir of the HKUSU,
* the Hong Kong University Students' Union Choir,
* the Singchronizers,
* the Student Chorus, the Student Union of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and
* the Ying Wa college Old Boys' Choir.
Mahler's Symphony No. 8 is widely recognised as one of the composer's greatest achievements. The premiere performance of this choral symphony, in Munich on 12 September 1910, featured a chorus of about 850, with an orchestra of 171. These massive forces led to Mahler's agent dubbing the work "Symphony of a Thousand".
Despite that the Learners Chorus is an amateur choir founded in 1979 with little funding, with its passion for choral music, and its mission to promote choral singing and to nurture young musicians, the Learners Chorus have invited and united more than 250 amateur singers and 100 orchestral players, together with 8 professional musicians as soloists appearing in this concert. The symphony shall take more than 80 minutes to perform.
From time to time, the Learners Chorus also commission choral works by distinguished as well as young Hong Kong composers. To promote the appreciation of music among students in Hong Kong, the Learners Chorus offer them free tickets to our concerts under the sponsorship of benevolent friends of the Learners.
The Learners Chorus is also active in charitable and community service. Since 2003, it has staged 12 fund-raising concerts and helped rebuild primary schools in Guangxi and Yunnan through the "Rebuilding collapsing schools projects" with the Hong Kong Christian Council. It has also helped install some 90 water cellars in the arid parts of Gansu, in co-operation with the Lotus Light Charity Society (HK) Ltd.
In the forthcoming 30th anniversary concert, the Chorus intends to raise funds for the "Senior High School Scholarship Project" to provide financial ***istance to deprived students in rural China so that they can attend senior high school. The project is organised by the Hong Kong Christian Council.
Tickets of the concert are priced at $1,000, $500, $160 and $80. They are available from 27 August 2009 onwards at all URBTIX outlets.
Further enquiries, please contact:
Rebecca Yau, Chairman of the Learners Chorus
T+ 852 6206 4485
Email: [email protected]
Concert poster: http://tinyurl.com/learners-mahler8-poster (pdf, 388KB)
Concert link : http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=90234751854#/event.php?eid=90234751854
The Learners Chorus website: http://www.learners.org.hk
