ALISON STEWART

Alison Stewart has been associated with the PN Choral Society for many years, as conductor and accompanist (piano and organ), and in recent years as the Choir’s musical director. Alison is also the founding director of Camerata, a women’s choral group. Her versatility has no bounds. By day she is Director of Music at Huntley School in Marton, and by night she will be training her own choirs, accompanying other choirs, giving organ recitals, and adjudicating in competitions. On Sundays she is a church organist, celebrant, and preacher. She has also performed as pianist in a local jazz band, and percussionist in the Manawatu Sinfonia. In December 2006, she conducted that orchestra, with the Choral Society and her Huntley choir, in a magnificent performance of Handel’s Messiah (see Reviews). For her genial firmness and friendly discipline in rehearsals, we love and respect her immensely.

SOLOISTS FOR CELEBRATIONS IN WINTER CONCERT 2007

DAVID MORRISS - BASS

David has been involved in singing for most of his life: initially as a boy soprano, followed by study with Mary Adams Taylor at the University of Canterbury, and then lessons in London with British bass David Thomas. Previously a member of Christchurch’s Jubilate Singers and Wellington choir The Tudor Consort, David now has a growing reputation in the Wellington region for his work as a soloist. He has performed with the Kapiti Chorale & Chamber Choir, the Wellington Bach Choir, The Tudor Consort and the Wellington Orpheus Choir. He also appears regularly in the vocal consort Baroque Voices.

Nationally, David is well-known as a presenter on Radio New Zealand Concert, where he can also be heard as an interviewer and record reviewer. He has given presentations on music to a number of groups in the Wellington region, and has a particular interest in historical recordings (dating back to the very early years of last century) and the performing styles & musical values they preserve.

For a photograph and more details,  go to:

http://www.radionz.co.nz/concert/presenters/david-morriss

JENNIFER LITTLE - SOPRANO

Jennifer has already delighted Palmerston North audiences with her portrayals of Yum Yum in The Mikado (2006) and Casilda in The Gondoliers (2005). In Wanganui she has been Mabel in The Pirates of Penzance (2004), and Maria in The Sound Of Music (1999).

In the field of oratorio she has been soprano soloist in Handel’s Messiah, Haydn’s Nelson Mass, and Saint-Saens’s Christmas Oratorio.

Jennifer was a semi-finalist in the Lexus Song Quest in 2007.

Reviewing The Last Night of the Proms (Wanganui, 2005) , Ruth Evans said: “Jennifer Little was a striking guest soloist, singing Summertime and the Mozart Alleluia with style, musicianship and professional assurance”. 

PAULINE ROWE - CONTRALTO

Pauline has been involved in singing since childhood, as  a chorister, soloist, conductor, and teacher, with many different choirs and groups, including the Palmerston North Choral Society; at present she leads the Foxton-Rongotea Combined Churches Choir. She is a regular performing member of Musica Viva Manawatu. Together with her husband and three children, she has done a great deal of entertaining around the Manawatu region.

LAURENCE WALLS - TENOR

Laurence is a professional singer based in Wellington. He was the tenor soloist in Hawke’s Bay Opera’s concert series, Le Rapport Français, and the lead tenor in Boutique Opera’s production of Purcell’s King Arthur. He is a member of the Chapman Tripp Opera Chorus, performing regularly with New Zealand Opera. In September he will return to Palmerston North to sing Nathaniel in Offenbach’s opera The Tales of Hoffmann in the Regent on Broadway.

GUY DONALDSON

Guy Donaldson was born in Wanganui. He received his formative piano instruction from Maurice Collier, and did his advanced studies with Maurice Till at Canterbury University. After teaching English and music at Rongotai College in Wellington, and Freyberg School in Palmerston North, he became founding Head of Music at  Awatapu College. From 1981 to 1986 Guy went into ‘private practice’ and a period of focus on his own music, including study in London with Paul Hamburger and Roger Vignoles. He then became a senior lecturer in music at the Massey University College of Education. He is now a freelance teacher and performer. Over the years he  has proved himself to be an accomplished accompanist, notably in recitals with tenor Ted Driscoll, bass RogerWilson, and soprano Anna Leese. He has distinguished himself as a concert soloist, and as a choral and orchestral conductor. He is the musical director of the fine local choir the Renaissance Singers, and was the conductor of the PN Choral Society for many years. He is pictured conducting both choirs and the Manawatu Sinfonia orchestra at the bottom of the CHOIRQUIRE page.

ROGER WILSON

Roger Wilson (Bass) is one of New Zealand’s most experienced and versatile singers. He was born in Dunedin, and began his professional career in Switzerland and Germany. Now resident in Wellington, he has been engaged as a soloist  by the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, by all the opera companies in the land (singing such roles as Gianni Schicchi, and Nabucco), and by choirs and orchestras nationwide (in all the great oratorios and masses). He is also known as a recitalist (including many memorable lunch-hour presentations in Massey University’s auditorium), and broadcaster (record reviews and introductions to composers), and music critic (opera reviews). One of his achievements is a recording of Songs of the Morning, music and stories written in the Antarctic in 1902 by his grandfather, Lieutenant Gerald Doorly MN, which was also performed at Massey University in 2003, and for the Scott Polar Research Institute in Cambridge (UK) in 2005. His first association with the PNCS was in 1980 in Haydn’s Creation, and one of his numerous notable performances was in Orff’s Carmina Burana. In December 2006 he was a soloist in the momentous Messiah in the Regent theatre.

ROY TANKERSLEY

Roy Tankersley is a music graduate of Victoria University, where his performance tutor was Maxwell Fernie. He completed Post Graduate Studies at the Guildhall School of Music with Nicholas Danby (organ) and Mary Verney (harpsichord).  He has directed various choirs over the years, including the Wellington Bach Choir and Bel Canto, and has been a member of many Baroque Ensembles. He  now works as a free lance performer and teacher based in Palmerston North.  His wife Pamela is the Moderator for the Presbyterian Church of New Zealand.  Roy appears regularly as a recitalist on organ and harpsichord, is Chorus Master for Wanganui Opera, a guest conductor for the Manawatu Sinfonia, Musical Director of the Parish of St Marks and St Andrews, the Manawatu Youth Choir and the Schola Sacra Choir of Wanganui. In 2004 he conducted the PNCS in a concert of NZ music, ‘Songs of these Islands’. In November 2006, he directed the Manawatu Sinfonia in a concert of orchestral music by Australasian composers (including a new piece by our local factotum musician Clace Schwabe).

REBECCA MURPHY - MEZZO-SOPRANO

Rebecca Murphy hails from Dunedin, where she began her musical career by joining her first choir at the age of eight.  On completion of her Bachelor of Music at Otago University, she moved to Wellington to begin studies with Flora Edwards at the Wellington Conservatorium of Music.  Rebecca has undertaken solo work with the City of Dunedin Choir, with St Paul’s Cathedral Choirs in both Dunedin and Wellington, and with the Tudor Consort (of which she is a member).  Most recently, she has sung the alto part in Mendelssohn’s Elijah, performed the roles of Phoebe in Gilbert and Sullivan’s Yeomen of the Guard and Polly in Dylan Thomas’s Under Milkwood, and as soprano soloist in Purcell’s Funeral Sentences. In 2008 she came to the city in the cast of Iolanthe. as the queen of the fairies. Rebecca has often been a soloist with the Palmerston North Choral Society, and in December 2007 she sang the soprano and contralto parts in Bach’s Christmas Oratorio.

MOLLY ATKINSON (1909-2008)

Our beloved patron passed on soon after entering her 100th year.

Molly Atkinson is Palmerston North’s elder stateswoman of song.

Richard Mays, editor of The Guardian, attended her “one short of a century” party.

“Music is the noble art, because it enlivens the spirit.” And by promoting music, Molly Atkinson is someone who has enlivened this community.

Tributes flowed for a woman who has had so much impact and influence on the national and local music scene. Miss Atkinson’s 99th birthday party attracted around 40 people to Palmerston Manor Rest Home.

An honorary life member of the Federation of Registered Music Teachers and of Chamber Music New Zealand, a founder of the Central Districts Ladies Choir.

Miss Atkinson is a patron of the Palmerston North Choral Society, and members of the group turned out to perform two songs for the occasion – Mozart’s Ave Verum and John Rutter’s The Lord Bless You and Keep You.

Awarded the Massey Medal in 1993, Miss Atkinson was made an officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the 1996 Queens Birthday honours list for services to music. She was a driving force behind giving music teachers status in schools and in the wider community, extending the contribution they now make to New Zealand’s music education.

The “perceptive and intuitive” judge of 10 Mobil Song Contests, Miss Atkinson’s decisions helped propel young New Zealand singers to stardom - among them Kiri Te Kanawa and Malvina Major.

Speaker at the birthday function, music educator and therapist Morva Croxson, also described her as an important singer, performing in the 1940 production of Faust, and singing at Government House when peace was declared at the end of World War II. During the late ‘20s and through the ‘30s, ‘40s and ‘50s, Miss Atkinson was a member of a select group of performers who established themselves as professional singers onstage and on radio.

Following her retirement as a performer in 1957, Miss Atkinson was a musical specialist engaged in establishing university extension in Palmerston North. She offered tuition, guidance, and advice to established and emerging singers throughout the lower North Island, and was an adjudicator for competitions around the country.

At 99, her eyesight and hearing may be diminished, and she is reliant on a wheelchair, but her thoughts remain clear and perceptive, and she still attends concerts .

HELEN CASKIE

Helen is patron of the PNCS.

Singer, singing teacher, accompanist, conductor, composer, and (not many people know this, but I do) poet.