Vale - St. George's College
Vale - St. George's College Vale - St. George's College
The Winthrop Singers Trip to China A GREAT RECEPTION FOR THE WINTHROPS' FIRST CONCERT In early August of this year, I was fortunate enough to travel to Beijing with the Winthrop Singers to participate in the 29th International Society for Music Education (ISME) World Conference. This experience has been, without a doubt, one of the most formative of my life so far, not only because it was musically challenging, but for the wealth of knowledge I gained about China and its culture. Our week in Beijing was jam-packed to say the least. We gave four concerts in total; two concerts at the Conference Centre (within walking distance to the Olympic Bird’s Nest and Water Cube), a concert at the National Centre for the Performing Arts and a Fringe Concert in conjunction with a local choir, the Beijing Baroque Choir. Our performances were well received and enthusiastically applauded by hundreds of local Chinese. Our fi rst concert was attended by over 400 people – a reception we did not expect! As well as performances we gave a workshop in Kodaly and chord singing, led by our esteemed director, Nicholas Bannan. This was a tremendous success and we were asked to be in approximately 10,000 photos! What was rewarding for us was that we could communicate and share musical knowledge with complete strangers, which demonstrated in my eyes the power of music, particularly choral singing. Aside from the Conference program, we had plenty of time to fi t in some culture. On the second night we watched the Peking Opera, which was a both an eye-opening and ear-blasting experience. The next day we visited the Bird’s Nest, the extraordinary architectural centrepiece of the 2008 Olympic Games, which was aweinspiring. It literally blew my mind to behold the athletics track on which Usain Bolt and other athletes had performed their miracles. Shortly after, Richard Pengelley and I swam in the practise pool inside the Water Cube, which no doubt had been a dream for Richard for some time. We also walked through Tiananmen Square and strolled through the Forbidden City amongst crowds hundreds of thousands strong. Equally fun was bartering for tacky goods at the Silk Markets, and the favourable exchange rate ensured that 16 The Georgian | December 2010 everyone got a “bargain”. The absolute highlight for me was having a traditional Noodle dish for my birthday (on the fi fth day) and then climbing a 900 metre high section of the Great Wall. It was amazing to get up so high and above the smog of Beijing. Equally thrilling was to imagine the work that must have gone into such a massive engineering task. Beijing surprised me in many ways. Firstly, the infrastructure is world class. The highways, railways, malls and facilities were top drawer; sometimes we had to remind ourselves that we were in a Communist country. We were given a reminder of this when we got lost trying to fi nd an Italian restaurant and found ourselves in the Russian District; a precinct that I assume was built when the partnership with the former USSR was strong. Secondly, the people were so enthusiastic to meet us especially at the Conference. Our tour guide, Mary, was a particularly kind lady and we were able to communicate with many Chinese thanks to her fl uent translations. THE WINTHROP SINGERS PANDA TO ALL TASTES....
Overall I really enjoyed the Winthrop Singers Tour to China; I believe we made strong cultural connections at the Conference and represented The University of Western Australia and St George’s College to the best of our ability, both in performance and our Workshop demonstrations. I would like to thank Nicholas Bannan, who conceived the idea of going to ISME and led us with distinction, the University and the College for giving us the opportunity to travel, my fellow choir members for being such great people to travel with and Richard and Jo Pengelley for providing logistical and moral support. LUCIAN WATKINS LUCIAN IS A SECOND YEAR COLLEGE RESIDENT, STUDYING ARTS St George’s College resident choir,the Winthrop Singers, has performed Evensong or a Eucharist every Thursday in term time since its formation in March 2007, writes their conductor Nicholas Bannan. The choir operates an outreach policy that has taken them to Albany, Denmark, New Norcia and Geraldton to provide workshops and concerts and fl y the fl ags of UWA and St George’s. Increasingly they have addeda bracket of songs from Broadway and Hollywood to the sacred repertoire they sing in Chapel. This turned out to be a life-saver on their fi rst overseas tour in August, as their danced versions of Broadway classics proved immensely popular with Chinese audiences, and also because a sensitive censor drew the blue pencil through some of their initial selection for being ‘too Christian’. With some judicious re-balancing of programmes, the Winthrops surmounted this hurdle, andas the ISME Conference is carried out under UNESCO protocols with regard to cultural openness and freedom of information, were able to perform sacred music written by UWA students to great acclaim. Chaplain Richard Pengelley and his wife Joanne took the wonderful photographs that accompany this article, and proved indispensible to the success of the tour in their roles as pastoral advisors and tour leaders. NICHOLAS BANNAN THE WINTHROPS INSPECT CHINA'S ANSWER TO THE RABBIT-PROOF FENCE alumniConnect – the new networking site for UWA graduates! The University of Western Australia has launched a new networking website that will enable its graduates to develop greater professional and social links with the University and its alumni. Developed exclusively for UWA, alumniConnect is a professional and social networking site that has taken advantage of emerging technologies to bring together more than 60,000 graduates worldwide – all within a safe and secure online environment. alumniConnect is free of charge and allows graduates to stay connected to their friends, get connected at reunions and stay tuned to UWA news and events. As a registered alumniConnect member, you will be able to: • create your personal profi le • search for other graduates in the alumni directory • develop your own groups and networks based upon your interests, location or other commonality. A group has been set up for St George’s College • submit and signup for events, see who else has registered • search for jobs and direct your career • upload and share photos within your group • build custom content from a wide range of feeds and online tools such as YouTube, Google, Flickr and many more. If you like the sound of extending your UWA connections and getting access to members-only features and benefi ts all in one place, then contact the alumniConnect Team at alumniconnect@uwa.edu.au with your full name, your UWA degree (including your last year of study). For more information visit http://www.development.uwa.edu.au/alumni MILKA BUKILIC The Georgian | December 2010 17
- Page 1 and 2: THEGEORGIAN A MAGAZINE FOR THE ALUM
- Page 3 and 4: Contents 5 From the Warden 6 Annual
- Page 5 and 6: From the Warden A “Grand Opening
- Page 7 and 8: Faith, Globalisation and Wandong No
- Page 9 and 10: 2010 Valedicts Andrew Ahmat Andrew
- Page 11 and 12: 5 7 9 11 1 L-R SARAH GADOR-WHYTE, M
- Page 13 and 14: ST GEORGE’S, CROSSROADS CHURCH, L
- Page 15: Chapel Report 2010 As usual it’s
- Page 19 and 20: The Little Dragon From Helping Busi
- Page 21 and 22: The Little Dragon Victorian Georgia
- Page 23 and 24: The Little Dragon 6 7 8 9 1 L-R SHI
- Page 25 and 26: The Little Dragon Vale Don Aitken (
- Page 27 and 28: The Little Dragon 1 NEIL CAMERON (1
Overall I really enjoyed the Winthrop Singers Tour to China;<br />
I believe we made strong cultural connections at the Conference<br />
and represented The University of Western Australia and <strong>St</strong><br />
George’s <strong>College</strong> to the best of our ability, both in performance<br />
and our Workshop demonstrations. I would like to thank Nicholas<br />
Bannan, who conceived the idea of going to ISME and led us<br />
with distinction, the University and the <strong>College</strong> for giving us the<br />
opportunity to travel, my fellow choir members for being such<br />
great people to travel with and Richard and Jo Pengelley for<br />
providing logistical and moral support.<br />
LUCIAN WATKINS<br />
LUCIAN IS A SECOND YEAR COLLEGE RESIDENT,<br />
STUDYING ARTS<br />
<strong>St</strong> George’s <strong>College</strong> resident choir,the Winthrop Singers, has<br />
performed Evensong or a Eucharist every Thursday in term time<br />
since its formation in March 2007, writes their conductor Nicholas<br />
Bannan. The choir operates an outreach policy that has taken<br />
them to Albany, Denmark, New Norcia and Geraldton to provide<br />
workshops and concerts and fl y the fl ags of UWA and <strong>St</strong> George’s.<br />
Increasingly they have addeda bracket of songs from Broadway<br />
and Hollywood to the sacred repertoire they sing in Chapel. This<br />
turned out to be a life-saver on their fi rst overseas tour in August,<br />
as their danced versions of Broadway classics proved immensely<br />
popular with Chinese audiences, and also because a sensitive<br />
censor drew the blue pencil through some of their initial selection<br />
for being ‘too Christian’. With some judicious re-balancing of<br />
programmes, the Winthrops surmounted this hurdle, andas the<br />
ISME Conference is carried out under UNESCO protocols with<br />
regard to cultural openness and freedom of information, were<br />
able to perform sacred music written by UWA students to great<br />
acclaim. Chaplain Richard Pengelley and his wife Joanne took the<br />
wonderful photographs that accompany this article, and proved<br />
indispensible to the success of the tour in their roles as pastoral<br />
advisors and tour leaders.<br />
NICHOLAS BANNAN<br />
THE WINTHROPS INSPECT CHINA'S ANSWER TO THE RABBIT-PROOF FENCE<br />
alumniConnect – the new<br />
networking site for UWA<br />
graduates!<br />
The University of Western Australia has launched a new<br />
networking website that will enable its graduates to develop<br />
greater professional and social links with the University and<br />
its alumni.<br />
Developed exclusively for UWA, alumniConnect is a<br />
professional and social networking site that has taken<br />
advantage of emerging technologies to bring together more<br />
than 60,000 graduates worldwide – all within a safe and<br />
secure online environment.<br />
alumniConnect is free of charge and allows graduates to<br />
stay connected to their friends, get connected at reunions<br />
and stay tuned to UWA news and events. As a registered<br />
alumniConnect member, you will be able to:<br />
• create your personal profi le<br />
• search for other graduates in the alumni directory<br />
• develop your own groups and networks based upon your<br />
interests, location or other commonality. A group has been<br />
set up for <strong>St</strong> George’s <strong>College</strong><br />
• submit and signup for events, see who else has registered<br />
• search for jobs and direct your career<br />
• upload and share photos within your group<br />
• build custom content from a wide range of feeds and<br />
online tools such as YouTube, Google, Flickr and many<br />
more.<br />
If you like the sound of extending your UWA connections<br />
and getting access to members-only features and benefi ts<br />
all in one place, then contact the alumniConnect Team at<br />
alumniconnect@uwa.edu.au with your full name, your UWA<br />
degree (including your last year of study).<br />
For more information visit<br />
http://www.development.uwa.edu.au/alumni<br />
MILKA BUKILIC<br />
The Georgian | December 2010 17
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