Until earlier this month, 60 choirs from the Blue Mountains, Sydney, Central Coast, Central West and beyond were enthusiastically working towards inspirational performances at Blackheath Choir Festival in late August.
The whole town was preparing to welcome 2000+ visitors for this popular biennial event, coming to enjoy beautiful choral singing in five venues around the town, happy people catching up with old friends in the cafes and pubs and swapping songs and stories on street corners.
With the outbreak gathering pace, it became clear the festival would not be able to go ahead.
Now fans and singers alike must hold over their enthusiasm until next year's festival, by which time everyone hopes to be in a much less precarious situation. The next Blackheath Choir Festival will now be held over the weekend August 26-28 in 2022.
All the great ideas added to this year's program will be rolled over to 2022, including the Festival Choir to be conducted by highly respected conductor Sarah Penicka-Smith. She had curated a truly exciting program of all-Australian music, for which 110 singers from our participating choirs signed up this year and we have no doubt will be back for next year's event.
Guest artist for the Festival Choir will be Springwood's young celebrity Jerrah Patston, with his infectiously happy song Rain is Falling. Blue Mountains-based indigenous composer Elizabeth Sheppard will also be featured with the choir performing her commissioned work, Gandangarragal.
Information about ticketed events as well as the various free events on offer will be updated regularly on the festival's website https://blackheathchoirfestival.org.
