Choir Description

Love singing but need encouragement? Join the New School’s Sing Your Heart Out Choir and your nerves will disappear! The Choir is led by a renowned choral director and focuses on music from the contemporary, gospel and world traditions. Join it and you’ll have the opportunity to sing some great songs with others, to find and improve your voice, to spend an hour and a half every week ‘singing your heart out’ and making new friends in the process, to improve your health and well-being*, and to perform in public for fun and entertainment.

Each class features:

• Lively warm-ups to strengthen your voice and build your technique
• Call & response singing
• Learning to harmonise
• Soloist-choir interplay

The Choir has worked on and performed a huge range of songs in different genres, and here are just a few of them.

• ‘Africa’ – Toto
• ‘Adiemus’ – Karl Jenkins
• ‘Amovolovo’ – Zulu protest song
• ‘Both Sides Now’ – Joni Mitchell
• ‘Bridge over Troubled Water’ – Paul Simon
• ‘By the Rivers of Babylon’ – Traditional
• ‘Can’t Buy Me Love’ – Lennon/McCarthy
• ‘Didn’t Leave Nobody but the Baby’ – Trad
• ‘Don’t Fence Me In’ – Cole Porter
• ‘​Freedom Is Coming’ – South African protest song
• ‘From Now On’ (from The Greatest Showman) – Pasek/Paul
• ‘Hallelujah’ – Leonard Cohen
• ‘Hooked on a Feeling’ – Mark James
• ‘Hush, Hush’ – Traditional
• ‘I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For’ – U2
• ‘In the Highways, in the Hedges’ – Traditional
• ‘Kiss from a Rose’ – Seal
• ‘Love Is in the Air’ – John Paul Young
• ‘My Love Is Like a Red, Red Rose’ – Burns/Douglas
• ‘Non Nobis Domine’ – Patrick Doyle
• ‘Oh Happy Day’ – Edwin Hawkins
• ‘Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head’ – Bacharach/David
• ‘Run’ – Snow Patrol
• ‘She Moved Through the Fair’ – Traditional
• ‘Sloop John B’ – Bahamian Folk Song
• ‘Something Inside So Strong’ – Labi Siffre
• ‘The Sound of Silence’ – Paul Simon
• ‘Swing Low Sweet Chariot’ – Traditional
• ‘Take Me to Church’ – Hozier
• ‘Thapelo’ – Sotho traditional song
• ‘​To Make You Feel My Love’ – Bob Dylan
• ‘Use Somebody’ – Kings of Leon
• ‘Viva la Vida’ – Coldplay
• ‘Vois sur ton chemin’ – Bruno Coulais
• ‘Walking on Sunshine’ – Kimberly Rew
• ‘Wayfaring Stranger’ – Traditional
• ‘We All Stand Together’ – Paul McCartney
• ‘Whispering Hope’ – Septimus Winner
• ‘With a Little Help from My Friends’ – Lennon/McCarthy
• ‘With or Without You’ – U2

Week by week the course builds as new skills are applied and the songs grow. At the end of each term (in December, March/April and June) the Choir showcases what they have been working on in concerts at the school for friends and family, in addition to performing in our End-of-Year Student Concert at the National Concert Hall – and there are other performance opportunities during the year.

The Sing Your Heart Out Choir is great on its own, or you can take part along with private (one-to-one) vocal tuition at the New School or with one of our vocal workshops. (Students concurrently enrolled for other tuition at the New School receive a 20% discount off the fees for school ensembles.) Although previous choir experience and music reading are not required, ideally new members will have taken some private voice/singing lessons or our Introducing Singing for Adults course before joining it.

*    Numerous studies have demonstrated the benefits – both psychological and physiological – of choral and group singing, including ones published by the Royal Society of Open Science, the Journal of Public Mental Health and the University of Limerick.

Assessments

Informal assessments of prospective new Choir members take place the week before the Choir begins each term, on the following dates:

First Term: Thursday, 26 September 2024 at 6.30 pm
Second Term: Thursday, 9 January 2025 at 6.30 pm
Third Term: Thursday, 1 May 2025 at 6.30 pm

Please complete an Enrolment Form to join the Choir, and we will contact you about these assessments.

Questions about the Choir?

CONTACT US

or call us on (01) 478 1884.

Previous Performances

YouTube videos of previous Sing Your Heart Out Choir performances in the National Concert Hall.

2023

2019

2018

2017

2016

2015

Safety & COVID-19

The health and safety of both students and staff at the New School is of the utmost importance to us, and we have made a number of changes to the school, its equipment and our policies to make this ensemble and all in-school tuition (tuition taking place on the New School premises) safe during the time of COVID-19. These include:

• Perspex screens in every classroom.
• Installation of HEPA air filtration/purification units where necessary – especially in classrooms where wind instruments and voice (singing) are taught. *
• Antiseptic dispensers available throughout the school.
• Cleaning and disinfection of both classroom instruments and furniture between lessons and classes.
• Regular cleaning of public spaces.

*   Sing Your Heart Out Choir classes take place in the school’s largest classroom, where a HEPA unit is installed.

See our COVID-19 Safety Policy page for more information on what we have done, as well as the protocols we expect all in-school students and visitors to follow.

Cathy McEvoy, Director

Cathy is a full-time musician, arranger, composer and educator, with extensive gospel and choir experience. She holds an honours Music degree from Trinity College Dublin and a Masters in Composition from NUI Maynooth, and she has additionally studied both choral and orchestral conducting with maestros such as George Hurst (UK), Axel Theimer (Austria/US), Robert Houlihan (Ireland) and Rodolfo Sanglimbeni (Venezuela). In addition to directing the school’s Sing Your Heart Out Choir and Company Choirs for our Music at Work programme, Cathy also directs Gardiner Street Gospel Choir, Portmarnock Singers, Sandymount Gospel Choir and The Gospel Project. She has been the recipient of several arts awards, including an Artists Residency at the Tyrone Guthrie Centre in 2018, a Travel and Training Award from the Arts Council of Ireland in 2016, and an EU Youth in Action in Award which allowed her to avail of Community Arts training in 2014. She has also worked as a vocal coach for both the Abbey Theatre and RTÉ Radio Drama and is on the Artists’ Panel of the National Concert Hall’s Music in Mind Programme. In addition, Cathy maintains a busy schedule as a freelance fiddle player, performing with a great number of traditional, roots and bluegrass bands, as well as the Dublin Symphony Orchestra, among others. Well-known artists with whom she has performed include the Manic Street Preachers, Mary Coughlan, Eleanor McEvoy and Ronan Hardiman (Lord of the Dance). Cathy has taught with the New School since 2011.

Josh Johnston, Assistant Director, Accompanist

Josh is an acclaimed Dublin-based pianist, singer, choral conductor, arranger and composer. He has worked with musicians across the musical spectrum – including Kíla, SJ McArdle, Breda Mayock, Keith Mullins, Peadar King, Maggie Breheny, Truly DiVine, Stewart Agnew, Hank Wiedel and Ronan Swift, among others – and is equally at home in jazz, folk and rock. He can be heard singing and playing on many albums, including The Shape of Things (2010), Asylum Harbour (2008), Notes Home (with violinist David MacKenzie, 2008) and Close Your Eyes (with Truly DiVine, 2016). Josh has directed three chamber choirs (the most recent being the Rosney Consort), is a member of The Lazy Band and The Gospel Project, and is the organist and director of music at Dublin Unitarian Church.

2024-2025 Choir Schedule

Thursdays 6.30 – 8 pm

Full Year (30 weeks)
3 October 2024 – 26 June 2025
First Term (10 weeks)
3 October – 12 December 2024
Second Term (12 weeks)
16 January – 10 April 2025
Third Term (8 weeks)
8 May – 26 June 2025

2024-2025 Choir Fees

1. Students concurrently enrolled for private or group tuition at the New School receive a 20% discount off the fees for school ensembles. See our Voice (Singing) Tuition page for more information about voice tuition with the New School.
2. Students have the option of paying an initial deposit and distributing payments by means of post-dated cheques or credit/debit-card payments (in either case, payments are made on the first day of each month). Single term payment plans are accepted only if enrolment takes place before the Choir begins each term (3 October 2024, 16 January 2025 or 8 May 2025). Although there are no finance charges, payment plan fees include an additional processing charge of €8 per instalment payment.

Enrolment

Enrolment in the Sing Your Heart Out Choir requires a completed Enrolment Form and full payment of the ensemble fee or payment plan arrangement, if applicable. Places in the Choir are limited, and we recommend early enrolment.

ENROL NOW

Late Enrolment
New members can join the Choir, subject to places being available, up to two weeks after it starts each term. Tuition fees for late-enrolling students depend on the number of classes remaining in the term or year. See the following pages for more information:

First Term Late Enrolment Fees
Second Term Late Enrolment Fees
Third Term Late Enrolment Fees

Purchasing a Choir enrolment as a gift?
Please complete a Gift Certificate Booking Form.

BOOK NOW

Questions about the Choir?

CONTACT US

or call us on (01) 478 1884.