The Soul and Harvest Choir of North Efate is raising funds to help participate in the Pacific Mini Games Opening Ceremony in December.
More than 160 youths and people from the communities of Emua, Sama, Paunangisu and others gathered together at Paunangisu village last Friday for a fund raiser organized by the choir.
Alphonse Jack, who is the coordinator of the choir group as well as of this fund-raising program, explained that the purpose of that event was to collect funds toward the purchase of their costumes for the Opening ceremony of the Pacific Mini Games.
Soul and Harvest Choir from North of Efate was selected among the 1500 artists who will perform at the Mini Games Opening ceremony at Korman complex.
Mr Jack said the choir normally has only 40 members, but given the arrangement made with Van2017, the number has increased to 160 members in total, which includes 50 women, all of whom will be performing in the community production piece in the Opening Ceremony.
“We are starting our fundraising now, given that there’s only three months left. We need to have some funds to set aside in order to purchase our costumes, which have been ordered in India,” he said.
“Also, this event was also an opportunity to expose new members to performing in public, as 120 of them are new ones in the group. We are having daily rehearsals at Paunangisu centre from 6 PM to 8 PM, and as a Coordinator I need to ensure that all members are fully confident in themselves to stand in front of thousands of people.
“We are working on the voices, dancing steps, and also on top of that, we set rules for the group. We also include behaviour mentoring because these young people came with different backgrounds and all have their characters and attitudes.’’
Mr Jack said the group will not only perform in the December 4 opening ceremony, but they also intended to participate in the Zion Fest, the annual musical event to be held from December 8 to 14, 2017 in Port Vila, during the Games.
“It is just a start and a rehearsal as well for our group, and I am very happy to see that they perform well, but we still need improvements. We plan to have a monthly rehearsal show like this in the next three months to be at the standard.”
Van2017 has used that fundraising opportunity to provide awareness on the Games and also of the ticket sales that are ongoing in the country.
Soul and Harvest is a religious group established since 1998, with youth from various denominations in North Efate communities.
It has signed a contract with Van2017 to have the right to perform at the Games Opening ceremony, and at the Fest Napuan music festival, which will also be held in conjunction with the Games.
Photo supplied