Latest / The Discussion Podcast / The Lunch Discussion - Altrincham Youth Choir Launch: Sing Frozen and Find Your Voice
Transcript
- 0:00So today on the Late Late Lunch Show, the lunch discussion is about music.
- 0:05It's about a choir, a new youth choir coming to Ultrigan. And I'm speaking to,
- 0:10Callie Udall and also to Simon Passmore, who are the people behind it.
- 0:15How are you guys? Good, thanks. How are you?
- 0:17I'm very well. I'm very well. So music, singing, choirs, you've got me already.
- 0:24I'm passionate about them all. But Callie, can I turn to you first of all,
- 0:28and just talk about your background in music, because you are a professional soprano singer.
- 0:36So, I mean, there's your criteria already, but how did you get into singing?
- 0:43I think the first thing was a video of me singing Pocahontas on the toilet around
- 0:48age five that my parents decided, OK, we want to get her singing lessons.
- 0:53And then I joined Chester Junior Choir, their kind of preludes,
- 0:58it was called, from age seven.
- 1:00And with that choir, I toured to Poland and Prague. And I think we came runner
- 1:05up in Sainsbury's Choir of the Year or something.
- 1:08So then I had the bug, joined Chester Cathedral Voluntary Choir,
- 1:13because I was a bit too old to be a girl chorister, which I was upset about at the time.
- 1:20And then i went on to do two years for my gap years at christchurch cathedral
- 1:24in dublin and judy martin at the time it was the only cathedral in the british
- 1:30isles that had female choristers so that was,
- 1:33pretty much the only place that i could have done that and i was really lucky to get wow.
- 1:39And and simon you you you guys met at the royal northern college of music that's
- 1:44right yeah yeah went at the same time at,
- 1:4810, 15 years ago-ish. 15. 15 years ago, not 10. Wow. And that is in Manchester, isn't it?
- 1:56That's right, yeah, yeah, just on Oxford Road. Okay. It's Manchester's only
- 2:00music conservatoire, I think.
- 2:02Yeah. That is right, actually. There were three conservatoires in the North.
- 2:06Actually, yeah, yeah, that's a good point.
- 2:08And then you teach at Chatham's School of Music, Simon. That's right,
- 2:12yeah. I'm full-time there Monday to Friday.
- 2:15And my job there is basically just kind of coaching the kids on whatever instrument
- 2:18they play or if they sing, they just come into my room and we kind of play through
- 2:23whatever they're working on.
- 2:24And I just kind of help them improve it. We're going to talk about the benefits of being in a choir.
- 2:30And I have to say also, I'm going to ask you about the challenges of it,
- 2:34because, you know, it's actually, it can be like herding cats,
- 2:37I can imagine, but just the power of bringing people together,
- 2:41teaching them how to sing and getting them singing together.
- 2:44And then they find their voices. It's quite an experience. And it must be a
- 2:48joy for you guys as well. So today we're talking about a new youth choir coming to Ultringham.
- 2:56It is called the Ultringham Youth Choir. Is that right, Callie?
- 2:58It is, yeah. We thought it was time Ultringham had its own youth choir.
- 3:02There you go. So we're going to be talking to Callie and to Simon Moore about
- 3:06that in a couple of minutes' time.
- 3:09You're listening to Radio Alty. It's Rod Maxwell on the Lely Lunch Show.
- 3:12And today I'm delighted to be speaking with Kelly Udall and Simon Passmore about
- 3:17their new venture, bringing a new youth car to the town.
- 3:22Callie, you clearly have been singing for a long, long time.
- 3:26What have you found it has given you, over and above, just the joy of singing
- 3:31and music? But what has singing brought to you?
- 3:35It's given me lifelong friendships. It's given me opportunities that I absolutely
- 3:40would never have had. I went to a state school. I didn't go to a private school.
- 3:44I didn't have classical music all around me.
- 3:48So it gave me access to that classical music and musical training that I wouldn't
- 3:53have had were you singing from ear or
- 3:56had you learned about being able to read music I mean was that something that
- 4:00you learned and and the technical side of music or was it still very much about the feeling if you like,
- 4:07I think when you're that young when you are when you're a child and a young
- 4:10person inquires for a lot of,
- 4:12children I think it's something that happens a bit more organically because
- 4:17sight reading it's quite a difficult skill to learn but that availability and
- 4:20access to the music and singing it every week is what makes it easier to happen quickly,
- 4:27and you were singing you you mentioned to me that you were one of the few females in a,
- 4:32choristers was that in did you say double yeah christ church cathedral the anglican
- 4:37cathedral day yes yeah church of cathedral i believe and,
- 4:43yeah i was there two years yeah and i mean a lot of the cathedral choirs at
- 4:47that time were mostly all all boys which,
- 4:50uh somewhat i always think was incredibly sexist actually but i actually sang
- 4:55in the cathedral choir myself we had a couple of girls
- 4:58sing with us also but that that being in that environment must have been quite
- 5:03incredible you You must have sang in some fantastic places.
- 5:05We sang five services a week at the cathedral. It was a real, real education.
- 5:13I definitely got good at sight reading during that time.
- 5:17And I mean, having sang in the Cathedral Choir myself, I actually used to love
- 5:22the Psalms and I used to love the different structures of the Psalms and the way you had,
- 5:29a piece of music to the words that were always different. You learned quite
- 5:32a bit when you were doing that, didn't you?
- 5:34Yeah, you have to really, really watch the conductor because there's no kind
- 5:37of exact rhythm to it. It's just you have to listen very closely to each other.
- 5:43And Simon, when did your musical career take off? When did you feel that you
- 5:49had some music inside you?
- 5:51Same as Cali, actually. I just went to state school up in the northeast in Northumberland
- 5:56and joined the local church choir and then was just hooked from there.
- 6:00And when I became a teenager, joined Key Voices, it was called,
- 6:05on Newcastle, Quayside.
- 6:06And that was an introduction to more non-church music, which was also amazing. Loved them both.
- 6:13And then just since then I've always kind of been involved in choirs somehow
- 6:17that was one of the first things I looked at when looking for somewhere to go to,
- 6:20uni or college was like what choirs are there nearby because like once you've
- 6:23started it it's just it's amazing yeah and I take it then you've added instrumentation
- 6:28to to what you do or pretty much yeah I mean but when I started in the choir
- 6:32the director of the choir also gave piano lessons so
- 6:35I was lucky enough to get lessons with him and then after that just kind of
- 6:38probably took it too seriously and ended up doing it as a job.
- 6:41So still, the piano is my main job today.
- 6:44No, well, I was singing back in the eighties. You were, you were not,
- 6:48it wasn't particularly trendy to sing with the choir.
- 6:52And, and it took me a long time to join our school choir from,
- 6:56even though I was singing with the cathedral choir for ages,
- 6:59because I, I, I thought that it wasn't trendy and the kids would take the mick out of me basically.
- 7:05But in the last, even I would say 10 years.
- 7:08It has that sort of that sort of feeling or that sort of a premise about it
- 7:13has changed massively and it's it's opened up it to probably a lot more children
- 7:18who would never have thought about joining a formal choir and certainly the way it's done now,
- 7:24where that formality has been
- 7:25taken out of it is it makes a big difference doesn't it call it yeah it's.
- 7:32Been cool but now people are realizing they're cool yeah and that not that is
- 7:37a lot down to how much it's now on tv and i forget the guy who.
- 7:44Yeah exactly yeah and and so they have made it more acceptable and people are,
- 7:50you see the joy in singing now yeah yeah absolutely children love singing like
- 7:55i have a four-year-old she sings all the time yeah i've heard my kids as well
- 7:59i think it's about keeping that joy going and developing it helping them
- 8:04yeah keep keep the joy of it yeah and when i mean if they do it together just
- 8:08being in a choir you learn so many,
- 8:10like important life skills that will definitely come in useful when they're
- 8:13older like if you sing together in a group you learn kind of you learn teamwork you gain confidence
- 8:19you learn to deal with nerves if you're nervous about singing in front of people
- 8:21it's so much easier when you do it as a group and for many people a lot more
- 8:25enjoyable as well it's you know it's it's like a good sense of community it's
- 8:29just it's all positives really.
- 8:31Yeah and beautiful music and I guess as children so they have the joy when they're
- 8:36younger but as they get older they need more of a challenge and that's what
- 8:39we hope to give them with this choir
- 8:42because children are able to take on much greater musical challenges often than people expect.
- 8:50A lot of choirs think maybe.
- 8:53Songs that children just want to sing the pop songs that they know but actually,
- 8:57if you give them some of this spectacular choral music that they would never
- 9:01have access to maybe they've never heard it before
- 9:05and teach it them from the inside and then they get to know all these harmonies
- 9:08and beautiful melody lines and yeah and the more more challenging it is sometimes
- 9:13the more rewarding it can be to.
- 9:15Perform yeah well i i'm going to come back to you and ask you about that technique i I mean,
- 9:21the differences between teaching young children to sing and adults.
- 9:25And how do you manage that? And keep it fun, because if it's not fun,
- 9:29it doesn't work really. So today we're talking about singing.
- 9:32We're talking about a new youth choir.
- 9:34It's the Alti Youth Choir. And I'm talking today to Callie and Simon.
- 9:38Take a break. We'll be back with them in a couple of minutes.
- 9:41So you both obviously have deep experience in singing and being in choirs.
- 9:47But can you tell me some of the unique maybe challenges of taking young people,
- 9:54and actually teaching them to to sing what what are some of the things that
- 9:57you have to be cognizant of and and and maybe do a little bit differently to
- 10:01what you would do with an adult oh.
- 10:06This one is easier to get adults to listen to.
- 10:12A tricky one i think that from a technical point of view this is more your area
- 10:15cali but of course there's voice changes when when you're a teenager for the
- 10:18boys and it's sometimes it's quite tricky to deal with that in terms of vocal health yes,
- 10:24but um i guess it's just in terms of general approach it's just the same really
- 10:28it's the music's there you love singing it whether you're an adult or a child and
- 10:32it's all the same things it's the sense of teamwork and singing together yeah i feel like maybe
- 10:39some kids might get distracted more easily than adults some kids i mean all
- 10:45kids i guess concentration fan is,
- 10:48more of a problem but then the challenge is making it more fun and engaging
- 10:53for them and that's kind of i feel like on the choir leader,
- 10:58and i guess part of it is maybe some adults will be better at sight reading
- 11:02because they're just over their time but if you're a young child.
- 11:06And you have no history of singing you're literally going on memory so you've
- 11:11got to break it down into chunks rely on their memory,
- 11:14more of the rehearsal will be note learning which yeah we just but that's fine
- 11:19that's normal it's just like kind of immersing yourself in a foreign country
- 11:23to learn the language like you just kind of,
- 11:25it just goes through by osmosis in a way so even if you have like no experience
- 11:30of singing or reading any music actually i think that we put that right on the flyer.
- 11:35The kids don't need to be able to read or sight read or have any previous music
- 11:39theory knowledge to come and sing for us. No, and we'll have professional accompanists
- 11:44as well at every rehearsal, so they will help with the music learning.
- 11:48And as people who've been involved in choirs, you must have seen the joy of
- 11:53seeing somebody realizing they have a voice and starting to really enjoy it.
- 11:59And that must be a very precious moment when you see somebody and they go, I can do this.
- 12:04I have a voice. Yes. And the amazing thing about working with children is if
- 12:09you have a child who is in the choir for many years or you're working with for
- 12:14many years, you really see that.
- 12:15Yeah. It's not necessarily very quick. it might be a period of a year or two
- 12:20years to see them growing and,
- 12:23deepening their enjoyment of music it's very special,
- 12:27well there's somebody who wasn't particularly sporty primary school when i,
- 12:31when i started to sing it actually gave me something that was a bit unique to me,
- 12:36and and i i built my confidence greatly in fact i i but i still remember my first ever solo
- 12:44on a Christmas Eve service, probably 1981, and I did once in Royal Davis City with just.
- 12:52The single note at the back of the church.
- 12:55And I lost the goodness. I wish I could replicate that, redo that again.
- 13:02You know, it's one of those moments where you think, and I remember my sister
- 13:08saying to me just before the service went, don't mess this up.
- 13:11And suddenly I was like a nightmare but but,
- 13:16that you know those situations they do build character and they they they do
- 13:20give you some other other skills
- 13:22really absolutely yeah yeah it's a great example of the performance the,
- 13:28this pressure of that moment and learning to deal with those situations that's,
- 13:34one of the many things that you can learn yeah yeah massively yeah,
- 13:37Oh, it's a big one. That kicks off Christmas, really, for churches.
- 13:42It kicks off Christmas. I'll tell you now, I still have nightmares about it,
- 13:46honestly, Simon. But I think I never liked reading that much in primary school.
- 13:52And I didn't have any confidence reading out loud. But singing was totally different.
- 13:58And it was more automatic.
- 14:03And that actually gave me personally a lot of strength, a lot of confidence and,
- 14:08i'm sure you've seen that with children you've been around and something yeah
- 14:12there's some magic about music it just i don't know how to explain it like it
- 14:16like you say somehow you can read when when you're doing it as part of music
- 14:20and like even things like,
- 14:22uh you know alzheimer's and dementia it and music has such a huge impact on
- 14:27that i remember my gran who had dementia could just couldn't talk but then if
- 14:31you play or sing a tune to it all the words perfectly.
- 14:34There's something magic about it. There's a choir in Ultringham and it's associated
- 14:39with the music place and there's a dementia choir.
- 14:44And I've seen that witnessed that myself and again it's that feeling of people's
- 14:49face light up when they sing it's something and you're giving them that gift
- 14:53that's a very nice thing to be able to do.
- 14:55Yeah absolutely. I was director of St Anne's church choir in the city centre
- 14:59in Manchester for about seven years and it's just an amateur choir but they're
- 15:02all Brilliant, brilliant. And there's a few music professionals in there,
- 15:06but not necessarily professional singers.
- 15:08And it was the ones who had the least experience in music who just came out
- 15:14and were just like, this is like a core memory forever.
- 15:17And for me as well. But I remember one woman who was a GP who was in tears after
- 15:22we sang this thing up in Durham Cathedral. She was just saying,
- 15:25that memory will stay forever. And it was just incredible.
- 15:29It's the most amazing thing to be singing in a choir.
- 15:32Apparently they really missed him. They really missed him.
- 15:35Well I'm not surprised you know but and again I think you know there's somebody
- 15:40who can be very technically good with music but when you're conducting a choir,
- 15:45it needs something more than that it needs personality engaging with people you can't just be,
- 15:51a teacher you have to be almost something more I mean is do you have you find
- 15:55that as you've been working with singers for example yes absolutely I mean I've
- 15:59got about sort of between 40 and 50 students one-to-one at I.
- 16:04Feel like I'm a different person with each of them because they all work differently
- 16:09and you have to get to know them and see how they click and what's their best
- 16:13way of learning and stuff.
- 16:15And also I think being a parent helps a lot. Absolutely, yeah.
- 16:20You find solutions. Yeah. More great skill set than before becoming a parent,
- 16:27working with children for sure.
- 16:28Simon used to play for all my singing lessons and competitions and exams and
- 16:33stuff at the Royal Northern and we're still friends 15 years later.
- 16:36So I think he's pretty good. It's a good chemistry to go into business together.
- 16:42And coming back to the point about emotion, I've been in singing and sometimes
- 16:48almost been in tears when I hear the power that joint voices makes.
- 16:55It's a real emotion about it. And for kids to have that opportunity is really special.
- 17:01I've got to take a break. I want to come back and talk about what you want to sing.
- 17:06If people are joining the choir, what's your repertoire going to be?
- 17:10Because I'm sure there'll not be choral music, which we were talking about before.
- 17:13But today we're talking about singing we're talking about the ultram youth choir
- 17:17we're talking to the two people behind us callie and also to
- 17:22simon and we'll be back with them in a couple of minutes time so when did you
- 17:26decide you wanted to form this
- 17:29it's a business but it's a it's a choir it's a it's,
- 17:33it's giving something back but it is a business when did you decide you wanted to to do this,
- 17:38i moved here i'm from the northwest but i moved back in february from London,
- 17:43and I haven't been singing for a couple of years because raising my daughter and other things,
- 17:50But just being back where I studied and where all of my musical training and
- 17:56most of the experiences were and then being in the same city as Simon and his
- 18:00family and we were all spending time together again, just started to feel like,
- 18:05a really beautiful thing way back into music and also something that I personally
- 18:12felt Altrincham really needed.
- 18:14There's so much musical talent in this area, in Trafford, but specifically in Altrincham and Hale.
- 18:21And I really feel strongly that children around here can cope with a high-level youth choir.
- 18:30I mean, a lot of the primary schools are good at doing that.
- 18:33And I often feel for the teachers taking on something like a Joseph,
- 18:38you know, because you've got the, you know, teaching them how to act,
- 18:41You've seen him singing, you've got the costumes.
- 18:44But I remember my old son, who's now 25 and sang for a long time,
- 18:48when he got given the part of Joseph, it absolutely changed his whole personality,
- 18:56and gave him so much more confidence.
- 18:59And it was quite amazing seeing him up on stage, having not really heard him
- 19:03sing that much. Suddenly he's there. And.
- 19:08It's a really powerful thing. and kids get the lovely thing i find about it
- 19:13is kids don't realize they think they're having fun,
- 19:16and they are having fun they don't get they don't realize all the other things
- 19:20that are coming with that do they no because they love they do love learning
- 19:24and they love being busy i can tell my daughter the times when she is,
- 19:29the craziest is when she's not being challenged or busy.
- 19:34Left to her own devices. So what sort of stuff? What's going to be the repertoire
- 19:38of the Ultringham Youth Choir?
- 19:40So we've got a come and sing day on December the 5th. For that day,
- 19:44it's just one kind of piece, which is a selection of pieces.
- 19:47It's the choral suite from the Disney film Frozen.
- 19:50And it's a good opportunity for everyone to learn some Old Norse,
- 19:53which is the language of the Vikings.
- 19:55I've got a Norwegian friend, Runa, who lives in a town called Arendelle,
- 19:59which was the basis of this Frozen film. and he's going to teach me the Old
- 20:04Norse, which we'll then teach the kids.
- 20:06And we thought that might be a good kind of fun thing to do for a kind of come
- 20:10and sing day, so if we can see what it's about, sing music that they'll probably recognise.
- 20:14I think most kids have probably seen Frozen. Then when we do regular sessions,
- 20:18in the new year, it'll just be a really good mix of great music, I hope.
- 20:23There are lots of choirs around Ultering that kind of specialise in some things,
- 20:26like for example there's church choirs where you'd be singing only sacred music,
- 20:31and there's little belters that does like a musical theater and pop and stuff
- 20:35and we're going to kind of we'll do,
- 20:37modern stuff as well as stuff from the past you know 500 years or so yeah it's
- 20:41going to be a very broad range,
- 20:44uh going to be exciting yeah it'll be something for everyone definitely.
- 20:47Simon mentioned it briefly for the come and sing day we're going to be singing
- 20:51obviously in old norse because that's the language that frozen,
- 20:54frozen sings in but choirs are also just a fabulous place for children to get
- 20:59access to all of these different languages and start to learn German, Italian, Latin.
- 21:06I was singing in French in the church choir in Hexham before I even knew what
- 21:10French was really. You just learned the sounds, learned how it looked on the
- 21:12page and then found, oh yeah, I'm going to do that at GCSE. It feels a bit easier.
- 21:17And I used to always love how when you sang a word, you often pronounced it
- 21:22slightly differently and you learned phonetically without really realizing that you were.
- 21:28But once you hooked into that, you just got it and you stayed with it.
- 21:36But you don't need to know all the theory behind that. You just go, that's the way we do it.
- 21:42And then you see the word in a different way, if you like. Exactly.
- 21:46One of the one really core youth choir piece is Bob Chilcock's Can You Hear
- 21:51Me? And very often choirs learn sign language to accompany that piece.
- 21:56I remember doing that age 10 or something, learning how to sign and sing at the same time.
- 22:02Just these kinds of experiences that you wouldn't get anywhere else, really.
- 22:07And so you've got to arrange a very wide variety of different styles.
- 22:11And I mean, the only thing I find today is that with Disney,
- 22:17for example, even, you know, kids are engaging with music from a very early
- 22:23age. They've made it fun.
- 22:25And so, I mean, I guess you've got to incorporate a little bit of that into
- 22:32the repertoire of a choir.
- 22:33Yeah. I mean, Disney's great at any age. I love Frozen.
- 22:38The music of Disney is, honestly, it's amazing. it's really underrated there's
- 22:41a guy called Alan Menken who's written most of the Disney scores over the last
- 22:4530 years and it's just it's genius I don't think he did Frozen but Disney stuff
- 22:50is always good at any age yeah.
- 22:53Yeah, well, I'm going to take a break and come back and talk about your initial
- 22:58come and sing day and also find out about then people, how people would sign
- 23:02up to join the choir and how the logistics of that are going to work.
- 23:06So we're talking singing, we're talking singing with the Altrincham Youth Choir
- 23:10and it's the newest choir to come to the area.
- 23:13We're very lucky, actually. We've got a lot of good choirs and this is now the
- 23:19next. And I want to ask you about the age range as well.
- 23:22We'll be back with Kelly and Simon in a couple of minutes time.
- 23:26Callie, can I ask you, so how do you define youth? What's the age range that
- 23:31you're looking forward to join the Ultraman Youth Choir?
- 23:34So we have decided to do it from age seven up to age 18.
- 23:39And the choirs are going to be separated into two groups. So it'll be seven
- 23:43to 11. That's going to be AYC juniors.
- 23:46And 11 to 18 is AYC seniors. And they will tackle kind of slightly more complex
- 23:52harmonies, longer pieces.
- 23:54They will focus a bit more on musical theory and the junior choir will
- 24:00focus a bit more on lovely lovely music beautiful melodies and then stuff and
- 24:07with more of a focus on oral skills and just like listening yeah building the
- 24:10foundations and we will look at a little bit of sight reading
- 24:13i'm assuming you'll you'll hope for a mixture boys and girls i mean in some
- 24:17ways although we were talking about you know boys choirs and traditionally cathedral
- 24:21choirs are boys choirs but often it's sometimes hard to get.
- 24:26Sort of teenage boys into this type of thing yeah it can be but as you said
- 24:31before i think choir is kind of it's it's not as,
- 24:34it's it's seen as cooler now than it was when we rehearsed us hopefully we really
- 24:39want some tenors and basses please yeah if you're a,
- 24:42young tenor or bass that would be fabulous so your voice hasn't broken yet you are also very welcome,
- 24:48so that's the thing i mean your voice is breaking when typically would you see
- 24:53a voice breaking into either soprano or alto or into tenor or bass when typically would you see that,
- 24:59it's kind of over a over a period of time i think sort,
- 25:02of i for me it was about 12 13 14 ish around there i think i'm sure it can vary,
- 25:10With girls, there's not really such a breaking, but the challenge is more that
- 25:15as children, children tend to push the chest register quite high with pop singing,
- 25:20musical theater singing.
- 25:21So then with choral or classical training, you're sort of bringing the head
- 25:25voice in a little bit sooner.
- 25:27I remember when my own voice broke and I felt almost like disappointed that
- 25:33I wasn't going to get the melody anymore.
- 25:36And then I realized that actually singing, I was a tenor, I sang tenor,
- 25:42it has its own language, it has its own range.
- 25:47Actually, sometimes it was gorgeous, but you had to be quite confident to be
- 25:52able to sing against the tide, if you like, sing against the main melody.
- 25:58The alto tenors and basses have the more musically challenging job.
- 26:01The sopranos just get to sing the melody most of the time.
- 26:05Well, I mean, physiology and breathing is really important in that.
- 26:08But I mean, I happen to say, especially with my memory loss now,
- 26:12I sometimes I can go off in my own little melody sometimes. And I'm thinking,
- 26:16have I got this right? You know, uh, you know, cause I, I, I haven't got perfect pitch.
- 26:23And not many people have, have they, but it's a confidence thing when you looking
- 26:27at some notes and you're thinking, I'm going from this B up to here or whatever.
- 26:32I've got to just go for it really. So. Yeah. Have you,
- 26:37got a perfect pitch? Sort of, I think. Oh, I'm jealous. I'm envious. And deep.
- 26:42And perfect pitch, of course, is the ability to pitch a note.
- 26:46You see, somebody say, I should test it nice, Simon. Give us a B.
- 26:49Yeah, I'd rather not, I think.
- 26:54So you've got the come and sing day, which is the beginning of December.
- 27:01When do the formal sort of, how are,
- 27:04you going to set up a week and you mentioned the two different choirs you're
- 27:07going to have separate sessions for those or how's it going to work Kelly so,
- 27:11alternate youth choir rehearsals will be on Thursday evenings five till six
- 27:16will be AYC juniors so that's from seven age seven to age 11 and then the,
- 27:22senior choir will be from 6 p.m till 7 15 so they've,
- 27:29and it will be at the Ultraneum United Reformed Church in Hale.
- 27:32They've got a really beautiful, modern hall attached to the church.
- 27:36I think I know where that is.
- 27:38I think I know. I'm just trying to think the road. It's almost opposite the junction, is it?
- 27:44Cecil Road, I think it's called. Cecil Road, yeah. Oh, yes, okay.
- 27:48I know where you are now. I know where you are now.
- 27:50And as part of that, I mean, I find that singing's lovely, But when you have
- 27:55a focus of like a gig or a concert, it gives you that extra focus, if you like.
- 28:02Will you be incorporating in a seasonal way or something like that?
- 28:07Yeah, absolutely. That's the plan. So we want to do concerts at the end of every term.
- 28:12And like you say, we will theme the concerts. So the first one will be the spring
- 28:16concert. We'll do lots of music around the theme of spring.
- 28:20Gives us a brief to find beautiful music too as well unfortunately we'll we'll
- 28:26have just missed the christmas opportunity but we'll do that next year.
- 28:31I mean i have to say i love christmas music yeah,
- 28:35it bounces along it's brilliant it's absolutely brilliant but i'm gonna take
- 28:39a break and then come back and just confirm how people can get in contact where
- 28:43they can look at and just come back and remind about the come and sing day that
- 28:47you got we're talking to cali and Simon about Ultragam Youth Choir
- 28:50the latest choir to join,
- 28:53we're very lucky in the area, we have some fantastic choirs and this is aimed
- 28:57at children you said from, was it age of 6 to 16, is it?
- 29:017 to 18 7 to 18, I was always only a couple of years but we'll be back with
- 29:08them in a couple of minutes time,
- 29:10You're listening to Radio Alty, it's Rod Maxwell on the Late Late Lunch Show
- 29:13and I've been delighted to speak to Simon and Callie about singing and I have
- 29:18to say it's one of my favourite things and I still get a great buzz from singing.
- 29:25It's lovely to have a chance to just belt it out sometimes and I know it's more
- 29:30than that, the breathing, but sometimes it's like therapy.
- 29:34You just get that voice and you just give it loudly and it's it's a wonderful
- 29:39feeling at times you know.
- 29:42It does feel good and and of course you're teaching breathing and and that type
- 29:47of thing which is good in other ways is quite good for formal,
- 29:51speech presentations and stuff like that as well absolutely i'm a yoga teacher
- 29:54as well so my plan was to do some yogic breathing exercises with them at the start yeah.
- 30:01Yeah get them into that good calm frame of mind for a rehearsal so just remind
- 30:06me about the come and sing day is that is that a just turn up and sing or you've
- 30:10got a register beforehand how does that work but you do have to book in advance,
- 30:15yes you can book on our website which is altering and youth choir.co.uk it's
- 30:2015 pounds for the day you get a whole day of singing 10 till 3 30 and then there's
- 30:25a little performance at the end for the parents
- 30:27get to come and hear your child sing the beautiful choral music from frozen
- 30:32and that's at the church of saint mary the virgin in boden,
- 30:36yes exactly fantastic and and then when does then when are you hoping to if
- 30:43you like start the formal um the formal choirs,
- 30:47they start on the 7th of january in,
- 30:51yes in january 7th of january after christmas which is a thursday.
- 30:56On the thursday and where are you going to be based again sorry,
- 31:00The Altraneum United Reform Church in Hale. It's really just off the High Street in Hale.
- 31:06Yeah, so the Come and Sing Day sort of acts as a try out the choir day.
- 31:12But if you can't make that, then you could also book a free trial rehearsal for January.
- 31:18And when the children come to the choir practices in January onwards,
- 31:26will they get sheet music? Will it be electronic? How is that going to work?
- 31:30Mixed i guess we could also we can send out electronic copies but we'll also
- 31:34have hard copies on the day yeah.
- 31:36That's part of one of the things that we want to do with the choir we want to
- 31:39build our music library so that any piece that we perform or rehearse we do
- 31:44have all the copies that the children get to,
- 31:47use there's something special i think about feeling like you've got your proper
- 31:50copy of music or just like a photo copy or yeah i,
- 31:55i i do i i um i i my biggest issue was singing these days is a lot of choirs
- 32:00like to sing from memory or they have achieved music in front and with my memory
- 32:04loss it's a nightmare absolutely and i,
- 32:07i never have the same confidence i actually do need to follow the notes and
- 32:12i do need the words you know and and,
- 32:14you realize you pick up so much about.
- 32:17Reading music just from doing it over and over and over again exactly it's like
- 32:22with reading like again my daughter's just starting to learn to read and she
- 32:26just picks things up because we're reading daily so
- 32:30the more you do it the the more you're learning,
- 32:33and people will be able to find you on socials just look up Ultringham Youth
- 32:37Choir you got a website tell me about that,
- 32:40exactly alteringamyouthchoir.co.uk at alteringamyouthchoir on Instagram,
- 32:46yeah and we do also have a crowdfunder for anybody that wanted to support our
- 32:50launch help us to buy music and pay accompanists and rehearsal spaces
- 32:56and if there were any local businesses that wanted to sponsor an exciting new altering and choir
- 33:03we would be very grateful there you go you've heard it if you've got a business
- 33:06out there you can get involved in this and,
- 33:09And the lessons are going to be, you pay for the lessons on a weekly basis. Is that right, Callie?
- 33:15It will be a termly fee. You can pay it all in one go or three installments.
- 33:20Yeah. Okay. Okay. Well, look, best of luck.
- 33:25And if we ever get a chance, I'd love to bring Radio Alty down and record you.
- 33:30We've recorded a lot of choirs in the past and it's quite nice to do, actually.
- 33:35We would absolutely love that. We'll let you know. Thanks. got things on okay
- 33:40perfect well good luck and have a great christmas and i look forward to hearing
- 33:44more in the new year thank you thank you.