Riga Cathedral Girls’ Choir TIARA, Aira Birziņa, Music Director
Riga Cathedral Girls’ Choir TIARA is one of the most prominent and most attractive choral collectives on the Latvian concert stage. The choir was founded in 1997 by conductor Gunta Birziņa. Now all the girls from the 3rd to 9th grade of the Riga Cathedral Choir School are singers of TIARA. Since 2000, the principal conductor of the choir has been Aira Birziņa. TIARA participates in all major events in Latvia – the Song and Dance Festival, large-scale concerts of on public holidays, various international events and world premieres of Latvian choral music. The choir has performed and participated in the festivals in Estonia, Sweden, Germany, Great Britain, Lithuania, Spain, Hungary, Italy, and others. The repertory of the Girls’ Choir is very wide, including Latvian folk songs and original songs, sacred and secular classics, romantic and contemporary music. TIARA has premiered many works of Latvian and foreign composers, such as Ēriks Ešenvalds, Lolita Ritmanis, Laura Jēkabsone, Rihards Dubra, Uģis Prauliņš, John August Pamintuan etc. In 2017, the choir was among the invited participants of 11th World Symposium on Choral Music in Barcelona. In September 2018, their voices resounded at the Riga Cathedral during the ecumenical service celebrated by Pope Francis.