Surrey and South West London are awash with high-quality choirs, and it’s never too late to join. Bruce Millar strikes the right note.
Imagine an activity you can take up at any age and without any training, which benefits your physical and mental health. In which the practice sessions are more akin to socialising than hard work. One in which, within a matter of months, you could be performing alongside leading professionals at one of the most famous venues in the land.
It sounds impossible, and for almost every activity you can think of – football, tennis, violin – it is. Choral singing is the great exception. If you were to sign up for Kingston Choral Society this autumn, by next March, you might be singing alongside baritone Roderick Williams and soprano Sophie Bevan – among the most in-demand soloists on the classical music scene – in front of a paying audience of 800 in Cadogan Hall.
Not every choral society offers such a fast track to the stars. Yet many choirs of real ambition – and this part of the world is teeming with them – eagerly welcome new members, whatever their musical background.
Kingston Choral Society (KCS) chair Debbie Lye proves the point. She signed up in her mid-40s for social reasons, having not sung since leaving school.
“I was a single parent, divorced, who had moved into a new area, and I didn’t know a single person who lived in the town,” she recalls.
Her social need was more than fulfilled – with that has come years of involvement with music, taking her on a cultural journey from the Baroque world of Monteverdi and Purcell to works by contemporary composers such as Cecilia McDowall and John Rutter.
Now 75 years old, KCS currently has just over 100 members. So, too, does Twickenham Choral Society – perhaps the region’s premier choir, where standards are correspondingly rigorous – which celebrated its centenary in 2022 with an original commission from Barnes composer Roxanna Panufnik. This year – its last under conductor Christopher Herrick, retiring after 50 years – it has sung in the cathedrals of Zamora, Avila and Salamanca in Spain.
Epsom Choral Society was also founded in 1922, with Barnes Choir (1953) and Teddington Choral Society (1951) not far behind. All three are under the baton of Julian Collings, surely the busiest musical director in the area.
Chamber choirs are smaller and may require a higher degree of musicianship, such as the ability to read music. Yet they still rely on amateur singers to work with a professional musical director/conductor and accompanist.
As Musical Director of the West London Chamber Choir in Barnes, Hilary Campbell – who once directed the P&O company choir that made a big splash on Gareth Malone’s TV show – has developed a unique language of metaphor and analogy to get her message across.
“It’s no good using technical language with singers who haven’t trained professionally – I can’t tell them to lift their soft palate,” she explains. “So I use imagery to communicate. Every choir is different and responds in its own way.”
This does not mean lowering musical standards: Campbell focuses on embedding good vocal technique – a legacy of her training at the Royal Academy of Music – and on stretching her singers beyond their comfort zone.
“If a choir isn’t getting better week by week,” she says, “I’m not doing my job.”
Nor are amateurs the only ones who benefit from choral singing’s distinctive pro-am set-up. Campbell insists that jaded pros can also get a real lift from the experience.
“The passion shown by amateurs during the musical highlight of their week is really inspiring, as is the beauty of the sounds they produce.”
And this points to one of the great strengths of choral music: the primacy of the human voice. Some evolutionary theorists believe that early humans sang before they developed speech, and the voice remains the universal musical instrument, capable of touching the listener’s emotions in a unique and primal way.
It is hardly surprising, then, that singing brings health and well-being benefits in its wake.
“Lots of studies show that, when singers make music together, they breathe in unison and heart rates equalise throughout the room,” explains Campbell. “It’s much the same impact as you get with yoga or Pilates.
“Moreover, there’s no physical object to protect you or to hide behind, which makes you very vulnerable and creates a special relationship with the audience. You have to be really brave as a singer, especially when you are learning.”
Many, however, are still coping with the legacy of being told as a child that they cannot sing. It angers Campbell, who believes that all of us have a voice and that she can mould almost any choir into a musical force.
Joining a choir is easy – even for people who can’t read music and have never sung seriously before. KCS has abandoned auditions for new members, finding them a barrier to recruitment. Instead, a simple voice test determines which part of the choir a new member should join: soprano or alto, baritone or bass. Very occasionally, the Musical Director, Andrew Griffiths, gently advises a singer that he or she might not be ready to join. In practice, though, this is rare – “5% of applicants, if that”, says Debbie Lye.
Sign up to a local choir near you
- Walton Voices – rehearses Wednesday evenings at Bell Farm Primary School, Hersham
- The Barnes Choir – rehearses Tuesday evenings at All Saints’ Church, East Sheen
- Earthly Voices – rehearses Thursday evenings in Church of the Sacred Heart, Cobham
- Elmbridge Choir – rehearses Tuesday evenings at Cobham Curve, Cobham
- Kingston Choral Society – rehearses Thursday evenings at The Hollyfield School, Surbiton
- Teddington Choral Society – rehearses Monday evenings at St Catherine’s School, Twickenham
- Twickenham Choral Society – rehearses Thursday evenings at St Catherine’s School, Twickenham
- West London Chamber Choir – rehearses Thursday evenings at St Michael & All Angels, Barnes
Meanwhile, two events that briefly rocked the foundations of choral music now appear to have invigorated it. COVID-19 instilled a reluctance to gather in enclosed spaces, even once restrictions had been lifted, and choirs experienced a sharp drop in numbers. But, says Hilary Campbell, people re-examined their priorities during the solitary months, leading to an influx of younger recruits in the past two years.
The BBC Singers—widely regarded as Europe’s leading professional choir—were then axed last year, producing an outpouring that showed the depth of the national love for choral music. Debbie Lye says the protests took the BBC and the government by surprise, and the choir was duly saved.
One part of the community, however, remains underrepresented in choirs: men in their 20s and 30s—perhaps more interested in what they see as male pastimes, such as sport, or less confident than women in their singing ability.
Either way, says Pete Dickinson, they have it wrong. Captain of Barnes Tennis Club first team, Dickinson joined Barnes Choir in his 40s after seeing the enjoyment his father derived from choral singing, even into his 80s.
“I’m unlikely to be playing tennis at that age, but you can go on singing as long as you can get around,” he says.
He hasn’t looked back.
