Our Programme for the City of Derry International Choral Festival 2025

The bus is booked, and we are packing our cases. As soon as we cast our votes in the Presidential Election on Friday we head north to be part of the City of Derry International Choral Festival. We are singing in two Community Concerts, and at one stage on the Choral Trail, with our Musical Director Eileen Tackney and Accompanist Sue Donohoe. 

Our repertoire is:

Joshua 

Nine Hundred Miles

Siuil a Ruin

Viva La Vida.

The Choral Trail schedule is here https://derrychoirfest.com/2025-festival/choral-trails/

The Community Concert schedule is here https://derrychoirfest.com/2025-festival/community-concerts/

Donation for medical aid to Palestine

As a non-profit community organisation, we always donate the post-expenses income from our performance to a charitable cause nominated by the choir members. This year we chose to support medical aid for victims of conflict in Palestine.

On Tuesday Sept 30th, our Committee Officers handed over a cheque with our post-proms donation to Gráinne Dunne, representative of Trócaire, who facilitated our donation.

We are grateful as ever to our choir members, our volunteer helpers, our donors, and our audience members for the generosity of their support.

Pictured below, left to right:

Fidelma Sheridan (Chair), Dermot McMonagle (PRO),  Gráinne Dunne (Trócaire), Bríd Brady (Treasurer), Paula O'Neill (Secretary).

Sing Ireland Community Highlight September 2025

 It was a good way to start the 2025-2026 year ... being featured as the September community highlight for the Sing Ireland monthly newsletter. This was a nice surprise for us to see.

[the link referred to in the newsletter page is to our Arts+Health Case Study, here]

Our Musical Director Eileen Tackney has been busy over the summer planning our programme of songs for the year, the committee have been busy arranging our calendar. We are well into rehearsals already, and our Annual General Meeting takes place after next week's rehearsal. 

Meeting our new Arts Officer at the Cavan PPN Summer Seminar

 It was our delight to be at the recent Summer Seminar of the Cavan Public Participation Network, which happened to be the first event for our new Arts Officer, Karina Charles. We wish her well in her new role; we have good memories of performing together at past events, and we look forward to working together in the future.

The Public Partcipation Netwrok is a nationwide organisation, in each county, whose remit is to be

"The collective voice for all community and voluntary, environmental and social inclusion organisations in Cavan, its purpose is to improve people’s well-being by involving the community in local decision-making"

As a community choir, we are delighted to be part of such a network in our county.

The website is at https://www.cavanppn.ie/

The latest newsletter is at https://www.cavanppn.ie/post/cavan-community-enews-20-6-25

This seminar was held in the museum in Ballyjamesduff. Cavan Singers were represented by Brid Brady, Carmel Gaffney, and Mags Amond. The room was full of volunteers from community organisations all over the county. Daniel Downey and Finian McNamara gave us an overview of the work of the PPN. Our guest of honour was Arts Officer Karina Charles; we also had interviews with representatives of Tidy Towns and accesibiloity advocacy; music by Cormac McCann; and as a special treat at the end we were entertained to a performance by a very talented young Irish Dance troupe.

Thank you to the organisers Aisling, Daniel, Finian, and our hosts at the museum, for a great evening.

May 13th 2025 - Sacred Songs & Sounds - Cathedral of SS. Patrick & Phelim, Cavan

Our 2025 summer concert, Sacred Songs & Sounds, took place in the Cathedral of SS. Patrick & Phelim, Cavan on May 13th at 8pm. We have to thank a lot of people who made this evening happen - 

> Fr. Kevin Fay and the parish of Urney and Annagelliff for the wonderful venue;

> Cavan Gifts Main St., the Town Hall Theatre staff, and Trocaire for ticket sales;

 > Anglo Celt, RTÉ Lyricfm, and Cavan Public Partcipation Partnership Network for PR;

> Panic Sound's wizard (and elves) for seemingly invisible setting up (and down);

> our patient Front of House and Backstage volunteers Terry, Mary, Seamus, Andrew, Pat, Raymond, and Colman

> our multi-tasking committee for logisitics all term and refreshments on the night;

> the inspiring duo Eileen & Sue who raise us up from start to finish;

> (and most importanly) those who bought our tickets and made donations ... we are *nothing* without the audience that supports us, and listens as we sing.

Trócaire donation link

Trócaire is helping us to deliver our donation from the Sacred Songs & Sounds concert in Cavan Cathedral on May 13th 2025. We thank them for this. Our thanks to all who bought tickets or made donations. The donation page remains open ...

https://platform.payzone.ie/customer/10770/product-list/details/30283 

Bealtaine Tea Party

Image credit: Pauline McDonald Smith

We had a lovely afternoon in the Johnston Central Library on Tuesday May 6th. Libraries across the country invited people to celebtrate Bealtaine together at an indoor picnic with music and singing.

We sang four sings - Look at the World, The Pilgrim, Can't Help Falling in Love with You, and All The Jazz. It was lovely to have some former members attending, and to see folk joining in. We also enjoyed singing along with Teresa McKiernan and the Friends of Parkinson's Singers, some of whom are former members of Cavan Singers. Thanks to Pauline McDonald-Smith and her colleagues at the library for organising the Bealtaine picnic and inviting us to be part of it it all.

Image credit: Mags Amond

Where We Belong - podcast launch

We were delighted to attend the launch of the Heritage Council podcast series Where We Belong' yesterday in Breffni Park Gallery. We were represented by committee members Fidelma Sheridan & Brid Brady, and basses Dermot McMonagle & Jan van Haster who took part with tenor Mags Amond in our podcast recording. Dermot & Jan are pictured here at the event with producers Savina Donohue & Alan Bradley 

Bealtaine Party Tuesday May 6th

We are going to a party! The Bealtaine Tea Party is in library spaces all over the country next Tuesday May 6th. we will sing some songs and listen to some others, have a cuppa and a chat. Details are in Johnston Central Library

Sacred Songs and Sounds at the Cathedral in Cavan

We are preparing for our end of season concert. This year we are inviting you to join us in the Cathedral of SS. Patrick & Felim in Cavan town, at 8pm on Tuesday May 13th. As well as singing our own repertoire with our Musical Director Eileen Tackney and our choir soloists, we will present as our guest musicians the organist Simon Harden, and the organ scholars from St Patrick's College, Cavan.

Our program of song for 2025 includes classical, pastoral, and traditional spiritual pieces, from the dreaming of Rutter, Larson, and Fauré to the drama of Orff, Mozart, Handel, Verdi, and more. 

Tickets can be purchased in person from Cavan Gifts on Main St., or online via the Town Hall Arts Centre website at https://townhallartscentre.ticketsolve.com/ticketbooth/shows/1173663990 

As with all our concerts, all proceeds [after costs] are donated to charity.

Cavan Singers featured as ARTS+HEALTH Case Study

Cavan Singers are delighted to be featured as ARTS+HEALTH Case Study for April 2025.

About Arts+Health

artsandhealth.ie is the national website for arts and health in Ireland. It is the central information and support hub for artists, arts professionals, healthcare communities and researchers working or interested in the field of arts and health who believe that the arts have a key role to play in healthcare provision and hope to inspire our visitors with leading examples of arts and health practice in Ireland and beyond. It is is managed by Réalta, the National Resource Organisation developing Arts and Health in Ireland, with the support of an Editorial Panel. The site is funded by the Arts Council of Ireland and the HSE (Health Service Executive), the public healthcare system in the Republic of Ireland. The website publishes Case Studies that showcase examples of diverse arts and health projects characterised by clear artistic vision, goals and outcomes ... the diversity of artforms, contexts, partnerships and structures gives an insight into the full range of arts and health practice across Ireland.

Cavan Singers Case Study 

Cavan Singers are delighted to be the subject of the Arts and Health Case Study published in April 2024. This highlights both the contribution that singing together has made to individual members of our choir, and the contibution that our choir as a collective has made to our community in the forty years since we were founded. The findings survey of our memebr carried out in 2024 are presented in the context of those forty years we have been singing together. You can read it, and all case studies logged since 2011, here, and you can watch our presentation in the. Johnstone Central Library here. It is nice to think that the video taken by the late Brian Daly, who was so generous with his time and talent on our behalf, is now linked to this Arts & Health website.

Our thanks to Emma Eager, the Project Coordinator for the National Website for Arts and Health in Ireland, for her assitance and guidance in presenting our Case Study.

Link to the Arts and Health Case Study: https://www.artsandhealth.ie/case-studies/cavan-singers-celebrating-forty-years-of-community-singing/ 

Link to Brian Daly's video of our 40th Anniversary Celebration: https://vimeo.com/916443571 

Go go go Sue (and company!)

 

Cavan Institute gave us all a treat this week with a marvelous production of Joeslph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Our own Sue Donohoe was Musical Director of the production (and orchestra conductor on the night) and some of our Cavan Singers were in the singing chorus. Acting, singing, choreography, music, staging were all a delight. It was lovely to see the entire Cavan Instiute involved in the production. Definitely a treat for the audience, a lot of whom seemed to know every word! It was also good to see the enjoyment of the younger folk who were seeing this show for the first time. A huge thank you to all involved.