THESE HARMONIOUS COLONIES

for chamber choir and small ensemble | c. 18' | 2024​

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Commissioned by the Chorakademie des WDR Runfunkchores with support by the Vaughan Williams Foundation 

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World premiere: 1 May 2024, WDR Funkhaus, Cologne. Members of the Chorakademie des WDR Runfunkchores, the WDR Rundfunkchor, and the Orchesterakademie des WDR Sinfonieorchesters Köln conducted by Gabriel Hollander 

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TEXTS​

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The text is taken from the following sources:

 

An anonymous letter by ‘A Letter of Truth’ to the editor of the Daily Southern Cross (16 September 1843)

An editorial from the Daily Southern Cross (15 July 1843)

‘Captain Wakefield at Wairau’ from the Nelson Evening Mail (27 May 1933)

Psalm 2 (King James Bible)

 

These texts are stitched together to form a kind of collage. On one occasion I added a short phrase of my own to aid comprehensibility, and made other minor modifications. Words in te reo Māori have been aligned with standard modern spellings.

 

Please note that the piece contains themes of a violent and colonial nature, and that there is use of language associated with colonialism. ​​​

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