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Status
Received: on time
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Income
£155.6K
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Spending
£143.5K
Public benefits
The direct benefits that flow from our purpose are: The enjoyment of choral art. The most natural of all musical activities, requiring the mediation of no instrument, using the human voice in ensemble singing provides some of the most pleasurable and intellectually stimulating listening and participative experiences in music, whether that be a
church choir performing a sacred masterpiece, an a capella ensemble performing jazz standards in close harmony, or a gospel choir singing spirituals. The Festival celebrates and promotes choral music in its full variety. Health and well-being. Many studies have shown the benefits in terms of health and wellbeing of choral singing, whether that be in physical activity and its positive impact through improved breathing and heart-rate, to stress reduction and the release of pleasure hormones such as oxytocin, or in reducing social isolation, particularly for older people by providing a group activity. Our Festival works with a range of choirs, from disability groups to breast cancer survivors and singers living with memory loss, all of whom attest to the benefits of choral singing. Social cohesion. Derry/Londonderry, in common with much of Northern Ireland, is a divided society. Music, however, is a universal language. We bring together choirs from across communities, and work in shared spaces acceptable to all. The Festival involves groups from Europe, Asia, the Americas, Africa and Australasia, either in person or virtually, the mixing of cultures offering opportunities for mutual understanding, recognition and appreciation. Education. The Festival offers educational and learning opportunities for singers and listeners of all age groups, but in particular choirs of school age, who can learn life skills such as team work, concentration and building self-confidence through performance, as well experiencing new work commissioned for their performance at the Festival. They can be demonstrated through: Audience and participant numbers. These have been steadily increasing since the first Festival, with more than 15,000 audience and 2,500 participants for our most recent wholly live event (2019). Our Festivals since 2020 have been wholly or in part virtual, with content views increasing from 260,000 (2020) to 450,000 (2021) from 50 countries worldwide. Our strong audience and participant figures, together we repeat attendance numbers, indicate we are delivering on the benefits. Surveying. Each year we conduct extensive surveys of our audience and participants. Satisfaction with the Festival’s offer is high, with 95% rating the Festival as good to excellent, and 80% rating out work as excellent. Within the Festival is a competition programme, open to choirs of all ages and types. There are those who argue that competitive singing is injurious to enjoyment of the art, which is or should be fundamentally co-operative not competitive. However, there are those, both audiences and participants, who enjoy competition, and participate in the festival for that reason. Also, it is not necessary to enter competitively or attend competitions to enjoy the full benefits of the Festival. So, we do not feel, on balance, that there is harm in this aspect. The Festival does charge for admission to some of its evening concerts. It could be said that there is harm in this, where an audience member might be unable to afford the ticket. In mitigation, we offer concessionary rates and heavily discounted group tickets. The large majority of the Festival’s programme is available at nominal cost, or is entirely free of charge. We do not see in any harm from any other of the purposes. The charity’s beneficiaries are: Audiences, primarily from the city of Derry/Londonderry and the surrounding area but also including visitors to the city who experience high quality music making from the range of choirs, both professional and non-professional, that perform in the Festival. Participants, who include many choirs and choral singers from Derry and also national and international groups, who travel to the Festival for the joy of performing choral music, to experience the singing of others and to learn from workshop opportunities at the Festival facilitated by leading choral directors. Choirs at the festival are of all ages, from seniors to youth and many school groups. The global choral community. Up to 10 international choirs take part each year in person, but the digital programme developed during the pandemic has enabled many more to participate virtually. In 2021 more than 60 choirs from 22 countries submitted video recordings to our digital choral platform. Payments of fees are made to professional choirs performing in our guest concerts, to workshop leaders and competition adjudicators. However, the artistic quality and educational skills of these artists is a reason why many of our audience and participants attend the Festival, and is consonant with the purpose of advancing the art an culture of choral singing, so we regard the private benefit accruing to those artists to be incidental and necessary. Payments are also made to a range of suppliers, e.g. venues, sound and lighting companies, publicity and marketing designers and distributors. As with artists, there is private benefit accruing to these individuals and companies, however their work is necessary in promoting the event to audiences, providing performance spaces for artists and participants, and enabling the evens to run smoothly and safely, so we regard this as both necessary and incidental.
... [more] [less]What your organisation does
The City of Derry International Choir Festival is the only voice festival of its kind in the UK. First held in October 2013 as part of the UK City of Culture, it’s conceived as a joyous celebration of all that ensemble singing has to offer. Its activities include concerts by world-renowned vocal groups, competitions for choirs of all ages,
workshops and educational events for singers and conductors, and a city-wide programme of community concerts and choral trails in landmark locations across Derry and the North-West. Whilst the main focus is on the annual festival, the charity also runs occasional concerts and workshops throughout the calendar year.
... [more] [less]The charity’s classifications
- The advancement of the arts, culture, heritage or science
Who the charity helps
- Children (5-13 year olds)
- General public
- Men
- Mental health
- Older people
- Voluntary and community sector
- Volunteers
- Women
- Youth (14-25 year olds)
How the charity works
- Arts
- Community development
- Cross-border/cross-community
- Cultural
- Disability
- Education/training
- Volunteer development
