Creative programs that transform lives
Creativity Australia News
NEW! Online LIVE Sessions Now Available
March 26, 2020With social distancing and self isolation becoming our day to day reality, we at Creativity Australia wanted to ensure we were still delivering our inclusive With One Voice choir programs to our members and guests, even if we can’t be there with you in person.
In light of recent circumstances, we were forced to suspend in-person gatherings and come up with something to keep us all singing together during this time of hardship.
We enlisted the help of our amazing conductors – 16 of them to be precise, based all around Australia – to deliver LIVE online sessions every night of the week. Each weeknight, we will be offering at least two 30 minute LIVE broadcasts per night with a With One Voice Conductor. This means you have 16 different Conductors to choose from. You can tune in to as many sessions as you please and sing along at home to warms ups, tongue twisters and much loved songs.
Here’s snap (below) of Liz from Chatswood delivering her live session!
Click HERE to find out how you can join in!
Round 13 of our ‘Start a Choir’ Grants now open!
November 15, 2019To celebrate its 10-year anniversary, Creativity Australia is offering grants of up to $10,000 to people or groups who are wanting to start their own With One Voice choir.
Applications for round 13 will be accepted and considered up until 5:00pm, 31st May, 2020.
Can you help us reach our EOFY target?
May 24, 2019
Double your donation up until June 30 to help us with our EOFY fundraising drive!
We need your help to keep our WOV Choirs running seamlessly. Your generous donations go towards all sorts of things like music, professional conductors, venue hire, staffing, publicity, digital marketing as well as all the boring bits like music licensing, public liability insurance and fees.
Most importantly though, it helps towards supporting people in need to be a part of these life-changing and life-saving programs.
Everything you donate during May and June 2019 will be kindly matched by our secret sponsor, up to the value of $100,000. How awesome is that?
All donations to us are tax deductible and we can provide you with a receipt to hand to your nominated tax agent.
Media Release – 3 more communities awarded with Seed funding grants!
May 10, 2019We are thrilled to announce that 3 more communities have been awarded seed funding to start their own With One Voice choirs.
The recipients – Kickstart Arts in Glenorchy, Hobart TAS, St Pauls in Burwood, NSW and Ben Woodd from Croydon, Adelaide SA – will establish inclusive community choirs open to all community members, regardless of whether or not they have singing experience or ability.
The three committees will now undertake mentoring from Creativity Australia whilst they are setting up the choirs. For more information, check out the full Press Release here.
NEW SEASON STARTING SOON!
January 18, 2019We’re about to start our new season of choir. Most choirs start back during the first week of February. Head to our ‘JOIN A CHOIR‘ page to see where your nearest choir is and why not head along and give it a try. No experience necessary, everyone welcome!
12 Reasons to Make Singing Your Happiness Drug
December 11, 2018Inspirational Melburnian – Tania de Jong AM
October 29, 2018Our Founder Tania de Jong AM hit the headlines last night when she was featured on the ‘Inspirational Melbourne’ section of the Channel 7 news.
The lovely Peter Mitchell visited our Creativity Australia HQ and spoke to Tania long with members of our combined Melbourne choirs about the benefits of community singing, our 10th Anniversary Concert and Tania’s plans for Creativity Australia in the future. Whilst he was here, the choirs treated Peter to a lively rendition of Singing in the Rain.
You can see the full story here:
To book tickets to see our choirs perform at Melbourne Town Hall on 2nd December 2018, please visit: https://events.humanitix.com.au/wobv
Media Release – Round 8 Seed Funding Grants Available NOW
October 10, 2018Round 8 of the With One Voice Community Choir Social Franchise Start-up fund is NOW open until November 16th 2018. Up to $10k up for grabs.
Click the link to read more..
Media release_Ten years of changing the world one voice at a time
September 12, 2018Media release_Ten years of changing the world one voice at a time_FINAL
Accolades flood in for Aussie singing social entrepreneur! Tania de Jong AM
September 11, 2018In a hat-trick of a week, Tania de Jong AM has this week walked away with three prestigious accolades, being named one of the Top 100 Women of Influence by the Australian Financial Review; number 33 of the Top 100 Most Influential Australian Entrepreneurs by Richtopia; and a finalist for Social Entrepreneur of the Year by Third Sector Awards.
This week’s announcements come on top of Tania’s already impressive list of accolades and awards, including being appointed a Member of the Order of Australia
(2008); being inducted into the AGSE Entrepreneurs Hall of Fame at Swinburne University (2010); receiving a Churchill Fellowship (1996); and being named Australian Social Entrepreneur of the Year by Ernst and Young (2006).
Tania said she was humbled by the announcements. “It’s been quite a week! I’m really honoured to have received this recognition, and to be alongside so many inspiring Australian women and social entrepreneurs who are being called out and celebrated for their vision, energy and impact,” she said.
“The news has definitely put a spring in my step and given me a renewed conviction of the importance of the work we’re doing to infuse a greater spirit of creativity, innovation and connection through the business world, the social sector and indeed all of society,” said Tania.
Tania is a speaker, singer, business woman, creative innovation catalyst and social entrepreneur. Over the years she has founded two charities, Creativity Australia and the With One Voice program and The Song Room, and a number of businesses, including Creative Universe, leading innovation conference Creative Innovation Global, Dimension5 co-working space, Inspiring Minds leadership programs, MTA Entertainment & Events and acclaimed singing group Pot-Pourri.
Alongside her work with her businesses and charity organisations, Tania does a large amount of public speaking, MC-ing, singing and performing and leadership development work. “There is such a shortage of great women speakers, let alone those who sing, and I’m set on being part of changing that!” she said.
Whether keynote speaking, singing and leading a leadership workshop, Tania works with businesses, government, schools and organisations to unleash greater creativity, unlock innovation capabilities, build ‘can do’ communities, help teams to prepare for rapid change and disruption, develop resilience and agility, and develop a more inclusive and diverse culture.
Ends….
For interview opportunities, please contact liana@creativeuniverse.com.au or phone 8679 6000.
www.taniadejong.com
@Taniadejong
WOV Sydney & Chatswood at Parliament House NSW
August 28, 2018SYDNEY AND CHATSWOOD CHOIR’S STELLER PERFORMANCE AT NSW ADR AWARDS GALA DINNER
On the evening of Friday 10th of August the choirs from Sydney and Chatswood came to together at the NSW Parliament House’ to perform a four song repertoire in the Strangers’ Function Room for guests the annual Alternate Dispute Resolution (ADR) awards gala dinner.
The Australian ADR Awards recognise both individual and team excellence in the area of Alternative Dispute Resolution. The critical feature of the ADR is that it marks out alternative dispute resolving mechanisms from regular court systems. Of note was the involvement of Sir Laurence Street who opted to use his knowledge of the law, his connections and his authority to help the early years of ADR development.
The Sydney choir under the leadership ship Robert Teicher and the Chatswood choir under the leader ship of Liz Lecoanet worked their choirs individually perfecting the performance in the lead up weeks to the event. Both choirs came together on the Tuesday before for a final combined practice run at the Sydney’s Choirs residence in Pitt street Sydney.
On the Friday, around 60 members from both choirs gathered in the green room at Parliament house for a warm up, some light refreshments, and to shake off the nerves.
At 7pm we took out place on the stage and once the dinner guests were we seated, with Robert on piano and Liz conducting, we opened with a magnificent solo operatic performance by Christine Varricchio singing the first two lead in verses of the traditional New Zealand love song ‘Pokarekare Ana’ with the full choir joining Christine from verse 3 onwards. The audience were stunned at the talent of Christina!
Our next number was a Bobby Darin classic the ‘Simple Song of Freedom’ and while it is fair to say we performed a fantastic rendition, it was our ‘freedom’ chant at the end of the number that lifted the roof.
Our third performance was ‘This Is Me’ from the recently released movie musical ‘The Greatest Showman’. We had all worked particularly hard on this during our Tuesday night practice secessions and with tricky timings to master we were still perfecting up until the last minute in the green room. The saying “it’ll be alright on the night” certainly came true here. Pitch, notes, and tempo were spot on and we were entitled to a little self-congratulations on how well be belted this out.
At the end of ‘This Is Me’ we went straight into a fun and livery rendition of the Monkeys classic ‘Cheer up sleepy Jean’ and without too much encouragement had the dinner guest clapping and singing along. We left the stage with big smiles and a rapturous applause from our audience.
Robert stayed through the evening to play some dinner music and reported back at the following Tuesday practice that he had receive great praise on our performance from many of the esteemed guests. We had great fun and are looking forward to a chance to sing again at a public event with one voice!
Brian Wardrop
WOBV 10th Anniversary Concert 2018 Flyer
August 27, 2018If you’d like to help us spread the word about our concert, feel free to download our poster and send to all your colleagues, friends and family.
It’s shaping up to be a fantastic event so don’t miss out and book your tickets soon! Download it here:
