The Perth Pride Choir’s end of year concern is always a sellout, and even with more shows added, they still sold out every session of this year’s edition dubbed ‘Starstruck: A Queer Musical Extravaganza’.
The growing size of the choir is obvious too, now swelling to over 60 members, the stage at the Dolphin Theatre has been extended to fit them all on stage, and accompanist Sammy McSweeney and bandmates now work off stage.
What is always on show, year after year, is an amazing level of local talent, enthusiastic comradery, and a commitment to embracing diversity.
For this year’s concert most of the songs selected were from musicals, but there were some intriguing and obscure choices in the mix.
After opening up with The Greatest Show, we quickly moved into a medley of songs from Stephen Sondheim’s Into the Woods. The choir worked their way through the title tune followed by sections of I Know Things Now, Giants in the Sky, No One is Alone, and Children Will Listen.
After working their way through the lyrically challenging musical that brings together everyone’s favourite fairy tales, they moved on to another Sondheim work, The Ballad of Sweeney Todd.
For a duet Lisa Buckleton and James Massey combined Get Happy and Happy Days a Here Again, one being a signature tune for Judy Garland, the other having being closely associated with Barbra Streisand. All of the songs were ones that have close links to LGBTIQA+ composers, lyricists, artists or gay icons.
For a rendition of Cole Porter’s Anything Goes the group had lots of fun with the pacing, making the song sound like you’ve probably never heard it before.
The choir lounged on the stage for a laid back and sultry version of My Funny Valentine, a song that had its debut in the 1937 Rogers and Hart musical Babes in Arms but is probably best known as a jazz standard with renditions recorded by Chet Baker, Miles David, Ella Fitzgerald, Julie London and Ricki-Lee Jones.
Choir member Ronald Lopez had a moment in the spotlight singing Sam Smith’s I’m Not The Only One, showing off some serious vocal skills.
Between the numbers members of the choir shared their own stories of finding friendship and community at the choir which has no audition process and anyone is welcome to join.
The first half of the show was wrapped up with You Will Be Found from the musical Dear Evan Hansen.
The second half of the show began with the uplifting Reflection from Mulan with Ronald Lopez and Rachel Ellery as featured vocalists. That led into How Far I’ll Go from Moana.
The choir grabbed their bowler hats for a choreographed rendition of One from A Chorus Line a song that really showcases the beauty of different parts of the song being sung by different elements of the choir.
The poignancy of AIDS drama Rent was showcased with Seasons of Love, a song the choir has performance many times over the years.
A real highlight of the show was a duet between William Morgan and Erin Scott who performed Forget Me Not from The Civil Wars. The combination of a tune from the rarely performed 1998 musical and the two singer’s distinctive voices made this a real joy.
The Pride Choir has always loved a Queen tune, and recounted at a competition once they got over-excited and delivered the world’s fastest ever rendition of Bohemian Rhapsody.
This year they opted for I Want to Break Free which also featured the singer with the best moustache in the troupe suddenly pulling off his shirt for a hilarious and fun ‘break free’ moment.
The party reached its crescendo with Kylie Minogue’s Your Disco Needs You, and a lot of disco dancing broke out both on stage and in the audience.
The choir continue to fulfill their mission of being a place to connect, a place to have fun, and a place of belonging. They’ve also made events for the rest of the LGBTIQA+ community filled with joy throughout the year.
2026 is set to be a huge year for the choir as they host Out and Loud, an international festival of LGBTIQA+ choirs.
Find out more about the Perth Pride Choir and other local community groups.
