By Anna Sargent
Musical instruments rang out in the Christ Church Cathedral last night for the first time since the earthquakes.
Ōtautahi band Woolston Brass performed a private concert in the quake-damaged building, before moving outside to play for the public in Cathedral Square.
The event was held to raise money for the Christchurch City Mission.
Adorned in hard hats and high vis, about 30 brass players filled the cathedral with music.
Woolston Brass general manager Todd Turner said many musicians had fond memories of playing in the building.
"To get the opportunity to play in here again after not being able to play in here for nearly 14 years is pretty spectacular," he said.
"We've done quite a bit of stuff in the cathedral sort of pre-earthquake, we've done two recordings in here, because the acoustic is just fantastic and to hear that again tonight was pretty special."
Turner said the band's set list was carefully chosen.
"You realise that when you get in a place like the cathedral you get that resonance; you finish a big note and it hangs on, so I think it was trying to get a balance of some really subtle reflective numbers as well as some gangbuster Christmas charts."
The performance in the cathedral was livestreamed, because only limited numbers were allowed inside for health and safety reasons.
Christ Church Cathedral dean Ben Truman said the rebuild was one-third of the way complete and despite setbacks work was ongoing to find a way to fully restore the building.
"While we are in a pause in construction, we are working furiously behind the scenes to continue this project. We still believe in this project, we still love this cathedral, and so we still want to bring the heart back to Christchurch," he said.
The Christ Church Cathedral Reinstatement Project decided to pause the rebuild indefinitely in August after the government turned down a request for more taxpayer money.
The cost to rebuild the cathedral, which was extensively damaged in the February 2011 earthquake, had more than doubled from 2017 estimates to $219 million dollars, leaving an $85 million shortfall.
Truman hoped the building could be opened on a regular basis for controlled groups, for concerts and other events.
"Next year we hope to continue this work of inviting people in to see the work that's being done to remember what this building has meant, and to see what it can be for the future," he said.
Up to 50 people were allowed to visit at a time, for a koha that would go to the City Mission.
Christchurch City Missioner Corinne Haines said she was thankful for the fundraising support, including from Monday's concert, as the charity geared up for its busiest time of the year.
"We're going to give 1800 food parcels out over the next four days. We had quite a number of people coming in just recently, we've had to turn people down there's no way we can fulfil all the needs of the city at this time... we just don't have the money to do that," she said.
Truman said about 600 people had come through the cathedral tours and donations had raised thousands of dollars for the City Mission.
