On Monday 18 July, 56 Concordia students (from Years 7–12) and nine adults embarked on Concordia’s first ‘Red Centre’ Music Tour. For the next 11 days, this group travelled to the Flinders Ranges, Coober Pedy, Curtin Springs, and Alice Springs, performing concerts in each location to a diverse range of communities and audiences.
In the months leading up to this concert tour, the students and their ensemble directors spent hours of time preparing, including two full days during the term break so that we were well placed to represent Concordia as best as we could.
Whilst music was the ‘vehicle’ which carried us, such tours are transformative for a great many other reasons. They offer opportunities to not only understand how to prepare and cope for time away from home, but they create community, offer insight into the way others live, enhance appreciation for ‘the simple things’, shape resilience, enhance appreciation for God’s creation, and the list goes on…
Tour highlights include:
- all of the concerts, particularly at Living Waters Lutheran, Yirara College, and Hermannsberg
- Walking around Uluru (9.6kms and not a single complaint from the students)
- Meeting and performing with the Central Australian Aboriginal Women’s Choir
- Visiting the RFDS and first Telegraph Station
- Hearing Mattson Jazz (one of our choirs) sing in Simpson’s Gap (Rungutjirpa)
- Sleeping in a dugout hotel in Coober Pedy for two nights
- Karaoke on the buses
- Karaoke at the YHS in Alice Springs
- Listening to the students reflect on their daily learnings and experiences
- Hearing from staff at Qantas, Adelaide Coachlines, cafes, the RFDS and hotels we stayed in that this was the most polite and considerate school group they had hosted
Whilst we may still be recovering from the effects of many late nights and very early (and cold) mornings, I am confident that the learnings taken from this monumental experience will be lifelong.
Enormous thanks go to Lee Pfitzner, Barnabas Smith, Deanna Whelan, Simon Kuchel, Martin Butler, Shirin Lim, Adam Page and Scott Darlow for their time and talents which made this trip possible. Thanks also to Jenni Watkins (Music Administrator) and Jackie Male (Angus Travel) for all they did ‘behind the scenes’.
Mat Noble
Director of Music
