Christmas is over. Our short break is behind us and we began rehearsals again last week, so it’s time to look ahead to a new choir season.
During last year, we had a number of new members join us and all of them have settled in and added to the size and quality of the choir. Sometimes new members come along because they move into the area or just find that they have more time for one reason or another, but they are always welcome. However, this year we have decided to make a specific effort to recruit new members, with a couple of invitation evenings.
If you’ve never sung in a choir we know it can be daunting to take that first step, so we want to try to make that easier. We have set aside two rehearsal evenings on January 17 and 31.
The idea of this is to let potential new members come along and sit in on a rehearsal session to see how it goes. Our MD and the committee are putting in lots of effort to make these evenings a bit of fun and will not involve new recruits in voice tests or even singing at all if they don’t wish to. Just as you might do in a pub or club, you can just join in and sing along if you wish or just sit, watch and listen.
In the choir we have some very good voices, we have some very average voices and it is even possible we have some who are not all that good, but in a choir it is about getting the best out of everyone and about improving on whatever abilities we have.
Like anything in the world, you get better with practice. We do use music sheets, but many of the choir cannot read music, as it’s not necessary, but it does help to see the music scores as you hear the other voices around you. We also sing in Welsh sometimes, but the vast majority of members don’t speak Welsh.
So we use the few Welsh speakers we do have to help non-Welsh speakers pronounce the words and we also have a variety of CDs to aid learning of both the Welsh and the music. We even have music for each section of the choir stored on our website for playing on your Iphones, tablets etc.
So the message is that singing is fun, a lot of people like singing and this is a chance to see what being in a choir is really like and don’t let things like Welsh or reading music put you off.
Apart from singing, being in a choir involves you in a number of other enjoyable and fulfilling activities.
We also get out and about in our own area with concerts, some indoor and some outdoor in Fishguard, Narberth, Saundersfoot, Lawrenny and Cresswell Quay.
This year’s programme involves four hotel concerts at the Giltar Hotel, Tenby. These are a different kind of evening, being a bit less formal, and often involve anything from stand-up comedy, to soloists and guitar performances.
Looking further ahead, we have been invited to sing at the Royal Albert Hall in London in 2018, so you could find yourself taking part with a number of other choirs in a concert at this prestigious event.
The final aspect of Tenby Male Choir is that we put on concerts to raise money for local charities and this year we will hold concerts for - the Red Cross, the Stroke Association, St John Ambulance, RNLI, HOPE, Bloodwise, the Arts Festival and Air Ambulance Wales.
Why not come and meet us and see if being in a choir is for you. Even if you should find that you don’t want to join in the singing at first or perhaps never, there are plenty of social events organised by the Friends of Tenby Male Choir and we would really welcome more people to join in this group to support the choir in a non-singing capacity.
The choir has a really interesting and information packed website. If you haven’t visited it at www.tenbymalechoir.org, then it’s really worth a visit. Amongst other things there are videos of the choir. These videos are all live, so they may not always be our best performance, but they are still enjoyable. Webmaster David Stewart-Walvin keeps the website bang up to date with news, photos, the choir blog and absolutely anything you need to know about the choir. If you’ve enjoyed a concert there is also a guestbook where you can put your comments and read what others think. David also maintains a choir Facebook page.
He can be contacted on anything to do with the choir on 01834 844926 or by email on [email protected]
A.K.