Cloud9 Women's Choir

We’d love you to join us…….

Someone famously said: ‘Well, it can’t be too hard to run a choir, can it? After all, Leigh has been doing it by herself for well over a decade.’ The Leigh being referred to was Leigh Wigglesworth OAM, the founder of Balwyn-based Women’s Choir Elation.

The half-dozen Elation choir members were discussing Leigh’s news that she was closing Elation while everyone was keen to ‘keep on singing’. We realised then that none of us wished to sing in another choir: we already had a membership, an accompanist, and a rehearsal hall, so all we needed was a music director. Oh, and music. What about music?

When Leigh heard what we were doing, she gifted us her entire music library and became our Patron until her death in January 2017. This extraordinary gift allowed our choir to access hundreds of works.

The new committee held its first meeting on 1st May 2012. And of course, a name had to be decided and after much brainstorming, the name Cloud9 was agreed upon.  The name was chosen because it feels like being “on cloud 9” when we sing.

One week later, we were interviewing our new Music Director, Tianyi Lu, who was training to be an orchestral conductor at the University of Melbourne. Emily Chow our accompanist was also at the University of Melbourne studying piano performance and had spread the word. The youthful Tianyi gave us our first twelve months before she jetted off to Europe for further orchestral conducting studies.

Before leaving however, she also found us our second Music Director, Gloria Gamboz, who for the next five years built on Tianyi’s start to Cloud9 Women’s Choir.

During Gloria’s time, the Choir welcomed back Annabelle Clucas as accompanist. Annabelle had spent many years supporting Elation and was well known by many of the Cloud9 members who were delighted to see her return.

We were sad to say goodbye to Gloria when she moved overseas. After a search for a new director, Christine Storey became our third choir director in August 2018. Christine led Cloud9 from August 2018 to early 2021 and further developed our understanding of how the singing voice works.

Christine introduced some more unusual songs for the choir, including songs in a number of other languages, and some songs with choreography.

In 2021, we welcomed Kerry Gerraty as our fourth Director. Annabelle had relocated interstate, and we were very fortunate to secure Sam Hartley as accompanist to replace Annabelle in 2021. 

Kerry continues to build the choir’s ability to sing as ‘one’ and brings much, much fun and laughter and learning to each rehearsal. Sam can sight-read music almost to perfection and knows exactly what we need from the piano to support our learning and singing.

Our Cloud9 10^th Anniversary Concert in September 2022 was a chance to revisit some of our much-loved music from the previous decade. Over half of the original members who joined in 2012 are still in the choir, which is a testament to the joy that singing together brings us.

A choir cannot function without much support from its members, who share their time and effort in many ways. This includes being on the choir committee, helping at rehearsals, supporting the back-end work that makes concerts run smoothly, and undertaking many other tasks.

Since its inception, Cloud9 has comprised a group of women who support each other and share a love of singing. The past 10 years have been a great journey and with the effort of many, it turns out that ‘it’s not too hard to run a choir’!

Cloud9 choir members are excitedly rehearsing for our 10-year Anniversary concert, scheduled for September 3rd.

We have had four Music Directors in our 10 years, all of whom have taken us on musical journeys which have delighted, surprised, and sometimes challenged us. It is a measure of the pure joy we get from singing together that well over half our members have been in the choir for the full 10 years.

With input from the choir, our current Music Director Kerry, has put together a selection of our favourite works and then added in some gorgeous new works to complement them. 

So put the date in your diary whilst we continue enjoying rehearsing to make this a very special and memorable concert. We’d love you to join us!

Forget the selfies: this is how a choir member’s 6-year-old family member captured our first concert in over 2 years. Here we are, singing our hearts out and showing off our many coloured outfits. How wonderfully she has caught our individuality.

And what a buzz we got from our return to performance! In her first concert with Cloud 9, Music Director Kerry led us through a range of songs chosen especially to mark our return to performing and to provide a salve for the effects of the last 2 years of living with Covid.

The works came from around the world and explored the themes of courage, resilience, renewal and the power of nature and togetherness. From Will Todd’s Like a Rainbow Shining written in 2020 as a response to Covid, to Irving Berlin’s Blue Skies, it was a masterful program; thoughtful, meditative, uplifting, and joyful. 

Our accompanist Sam performed two of his own compositions, Autumn Winds and Spring Rains, in a superbly virtuosic manner which had the audience totally enthralled.

I’m now looking forward to our September concert which will be particularly special as we will be marking the 10^th Anniversary of the formation of Cloud9 Women’s Choir. Watch this site or our Facebook page for further details.

Janice, Choir and Committee member.