Jubilation performs at the Auckland Fringe Festival 2017

Ponsonby’s own gospel choir Jubilation is set to spread some righteous noise around greater Auckland as part of the Auckland Fringe Festival 2017.

The vocal super-group features long-time bluesman Rick Bryant (Windy City Strugglers), chanteuse extraordinaire Jackie Clarke (The Ladykillers) and musical theatre supernova Jennifer Ward Lealand, as well as several professional musicians, a psychologist, a builder, a maker of superyachts, a handful of actors and a lecturer in Russian.

The choir meets every week at the Unitarian Hall on Ponsonby Road to sing up a storm, and have performed all over the country to audiences large and small, from 10,000 at WOMAD to an intimate 60-something at the Old Cheese Factory near Arrowtown.

The Jubilation repertoire includes gospel, soul, blues and country from the songbooks of Nina Simone, Tom Waits, Curtis Mayfield, Isaac Hayes, Blind Willie Johnson, Don McGlashan and Emmy Lou Harris, among others.

Most recently in Auckland, Jubilation sang with Neil Finn and the Topp Twins at the Kiwis on Board concert to welcome refugees to New Zealand, at the Waiheke Jazz Festival 2016, and at the Grey Lynn RSA to commemorate Anzac Day. Their three Auckland Fringe Festival gigs are Jubilation’s first outing in 2017, so if you want to hear the naked human voice in all its glory, make sure you don’t miss them. Tickets are available via iticket.

www.jubilation.co.nz

Photography: Jane Ussher