About Us
We are currently looking for some new players – particularly upper strings. If you’d like to join the orchestra, please contact us to check availability of places – we’d love to hear from you.
We are compiling a database of people interested in our future concerts, so please contact us if you'd like to have your name added.
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Resonance Ensemble was formed in February 2012, and is now firmly established as an integral part of the musical landscape of Christchurch and beyond. Recognised as a high-quality, innovative and flexible orchestral ensemble, Resonance provides opportunities for musicians and audiences to experience both popular and novel repertoire beyond the more standard fare offered by Christchurch’s only fully professional orchestra. Programmes range from music for chamber orchestra, works for larger ensemble, and New Zealand compositions, including new commissions.
The orchestra rehearses weekly, presenting three or four concerts per year, and works primarily with Christchurch-based conductors and soloists. Recent conductors have included Tony Ryan, Helen Renaud and Anthony Ferner.
The 2020 concert programme has been disrupted (as have performances worldwide) by the covid-19 pandemic.
However, as well as the Liberation concert held on 23 July, there will two more concerts this year: 20 September and 29 November.
Join Resonance Ensemble to celebrate the diversity of music inspired by America. From the simple beauty of the Appalachian Mountains, the lasting impressions of Dvořák visiting America for the first time in his American Suite, to the jazz-inspired bustle of New York.
The programme features Copland's Appalachian Spring, On the Town by Bernstein, and Barber's haunting Adagio for Strings. The orchestra includes some extra instruments: saxes, piano, and a typewriter as an addition to the percussion section. Leroy Anderson's quirky and innovative work The Typewriter, written in 1950, uses all the iconic sounds of the typewriter. This fun, novel piece completes the journey through American orchestral music.
Book now! Please note that due to covid-19 restrictions all seats for the auditorium are now booked. However, you can still attend the live-stream in The Chamber at The Piano. Tickets cost $10 - book at the link above.
Conductor: Helen Renaud
Christchurch bassoonist, saxophonist and conductor, Helen Renaud has been the HOD of Music at Burnside High School, where she now works part-time. She studied bassoon at the Wellington Conservatorium of Music, and Music History at the University of Victoria before receiving her teaching qualification. In 2009 she graduated with a Masters in Music from the University of Melbourne, where she focused on conducting. It was here that she was taught by the late Professor John Hopkins OBE and Richard Gill OAM.
Since then she has been working to develop her conducting skills as the Conductor of the Burnside High School Orchestra, Symphonic Band and Junior Concert Band. In 2018 she completed her Doctorate in Musical Arts, looking at rehearsal techniques for high school and youth ensembles.
Helen plays baritone saxophone with the All Girl Big Band, and was appointed conductor of the University of Canterbury Christchurch Youth Orchestra in 2016.
Leader: Cornelia Didenco
Cornelia was born in Moldova, one of the ex-Soviet Union republics and is a graduate of the Moldavian State Conservatorium. She has more than 30 years’ experience teaching and for most of that time has also played in symphony orchestras in both Moldova and New Zealand. During her time in the Moldavian Symphony Orchestra she performed at the Sala Verdi in La Scala, and at other prestigious venues in Italy, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, and Romania.
After emigrating to New Zealand, she joined the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra and has also appeared as a soloist and in chamber groups, and as the leader of the Resonance Ensemble. Since joining the CSO she has toured with them to Japan and performed with celebrities such as Diana Krall, Cliff Richard, George Benson, Serj Tankian, and Andrea Bocelli.