Rieger Pipe Organ in the Town Hall, Christchurch, New Zealand
2025 King's Birthday concert fast approaching!
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Dear Friend of the Town Hall Organ,
Personal greetings from me, Martin Setchell, your Town Hall organ curator, on behalf of the Friends of the Christchurch Town Hall Organ. As I mentioned in my recent email to you all, thanks to the support of the Friends of the Christchurch Town Hall Organ Trust, and Venues Management Otautahi, my annual FREE organ curator’s concert this year will again take place in the Town Hall auditorium on King's Birthday public holiday afternoon, Monday 2 June 2025 at 2.30pm. By popular demand, Thomas Eves makes a welcome return as my guest artist for another 'Sound the Trumpet' concert which was so well received in 2023. Thomas is principal trumpet with the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra, and he will join me to play scintillating Baroque music by Viadana and Bach, as well as the witty Sonatina for trumpet and organ by Hans Hielscher.
I have also invited a young, talented Christchurch organist (whom I've had the pleasure of mentoring over the last few years), to contribute an item. Sea-am Thompson, currently organ and choral scholar at Christchurch Cathedral and accompanist for the Christchurch City Choir will be leaving us to take up an Organ Scholarship at Magdalen College, Oxford in September. |
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Although the concert is free, you need to reserve your seat using Eventbrite. To do that:
I do hope you will be able to join us for this annual celebration of our iconic Rieger pipe organ in concert.
- Click this link and it will take you direct to the Eventbrite booking site with all the details
- Scroll down to the bottom and click the red bar marked GET TICKETS.
- On the next screen under Tickets, hit the + sign till it shows the number of tickets you want.
- Once again, the Trust is bringing you this concert FREE OF CHARGE, but is requesting a koha/donation of $10 (or whatever you can afford) to help defray our costs. (Being a public holiday there are extra costs e.g. for our Venues Otautahi house staff). Please help us to keep this annual event free; every little helps the cause!
- If you wish, you can donate online or you can donate in cash at the concert on the day. As we are a registered charitable trust, all donations of $5 or more qualify for the 33% IRD donation rebate. Our treasurer will email you a receipt if you supply your email address.
- Then hit CHECK OUT and fill in the fields marked CONTACT INFORMATION so your booking can be confirmed by email.
- Then scroll down to the last bit marked Ticket 1 General Admission and fill in the name of the person attending. If more than one in your group, do the same for Ticket 2, 3, and so on.
- Finally, hit the red bar marked REGISTER at the bottom of the page and checkout.
I do hope you will be able to join us for this annual celebration of our iconic Rieger pipe organ in concert.
There is a great deal of new content and fresh material on nzorgan.com. Coming events and news of the Friends Trust will be publicised here. But we also aim to maintain this site with a compilation of its unique and historic photos, events, and everything else that we followed in the 13 years the Rieger organ was active in the Town Hall before the earthquakes and all that is happening since. As these pages were originally a footprint in time, the narrative text about the installation and opening events are just as they were recorded.
If you have difficulty accessing this site, please contact us through the form here
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