International choral q̓at̓ᶿaymɩxʷ (Kathaumixw) 2025 is almost here, but it has been in the making for the past two years. The festival, which will take place Tuesday, July 1, to Saturday, July 5, is also a competition for visiting international, Canadian and qathet-based choir singers.
Artistic director festival and conductor Walter Martella spoke to the Peak about this year's highlights.
"The opening concert is going to be wonderful," said Martella. "We have the parade of choirs, international choral spotlights and the Festival Brass Ensemble and the Festival Chorus performing."
Martella said the spotlight performances are meant to be surprises to the audience, so they are not mentioned in the festival program.
"They're just surprises, but one performer I will mention is a soloist who is only seven years old," said Martella. "Then, the Festival Brass Ensemble is a group of musicians from Victoria; I will be conducting the choral works that are at the end of the opening night."
The highlight of opening night is the finale, when a choral arrangement of “Bohemian Rhapsody” will be sung, accompanied by dancers choreographed by Paige Anderson.
"Our artist-in-residence choir is the Male ENsemble Philippines, an ensemble from the Philippines," said Martella. "They're going to be featured throughout the festival."
Two of the guest choirs have been winners at past International Choral q̓at̓ᶿaymɩxʷ festivals: Young People’s Chorus of New York City and Toronto Children’s Chorus.
"Throughout the week, we have 16 concerts, so every choir that travels here will perform three times," said Martella. "We have the promenade concert in Tla'amin on Friday; this will be the third time we have done this."
On Thursday, July 3, in the evening, there will be some fun concerts called a choral showcase, featuring visiting choirs alongside qathet's Academy Chamber Choir, with a live band accompaniment.
"The night finishes with songs by [the music group] Coldplay," said Martella. "I've travelled quite a bit, and in a lot of places the music is slowly changing into what would be considered a newer standard, or what the public is used to hearing."
Symphony orchestras and choral/choir concert performances now usually incorporate some form of modern music in order to keep the music fresh and attract new and younger audiences.
"It's definitely happening more and more, where you see rock artists teaming up with an orchestra," said Martella. "It's a way to bridge the gap between orchestral people and more current mainstream pop people, to show everybody that music is music."
There are a total of 21 groups travelling to this year's festival and 750 people singing at the closing night performance.
"It's amazing," said Martella. "We're ecstatic here; it's been a two year stretch, but now, a little bit of the pressure is off."
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