In Part 1, I looked at some of the more obvious reasons why choirs begin to falter: the impact of Covid, ageing membership, toxic behaviour, over-ambitious projects, and too many concerts.
In this second part, I want to explore some of the longer-term and less visible causes — the ones that creep in gradually or hide behind apparent success.
Complacency
In an ideal world, your choir will be thriving. Numbers rise, standards improve, and singers enjoy themselves. Everything seems to be going well. The danger is that this success gets taken for granted. Effort eases off. Warm-ups become less carefully planned, recruitment loses momentum, and singers are less involved in shaping the choir.
Solution
A choir is always a work in progress. It needs energy
and attention even when things are going well. Don’t take your eye off the
ball. If the load becomes too heavy for one person, delegate. Try to approach
every rehearsal as if it were your first. See
What would you do differently if you were starting your choir today?
Local competition
Once, a community choir might have been the only one in town. Now, in many places, there are choirs of every type and style. Singers are spoilt for choice. Some may decide your choir doesn’t offer what they want and move on to another.
Solution
Don’t change who you are. People join because they share
your vision. But some singers may only have joined because there were no
alternatives. Be clear about what you offer — your unique selling point. What
makes your choir different from the others?
Loss of leader enthusiasm
Choir leaders are human. After many years of doing the same job, enthusiasm can fade. Leading a choir takes time, effort, and emotional energy. It can gradually start to feel like a burden rather than a pleasure. Life outside rehearsal doesn’t stop either, and personal pressures can take their toll. When a leader’s enthusiasm drops, the choir feels it.
Solution
The leader may be able to rediscover their passion — but
only if they truly want to (see
Back to basics: how to reawaken your passion as a choir leader). If not, and the choir wishes to continue, it may be time to recruit a new
leader. See
How to recruit a new leader for your choir.
Not ‘seeing’ the choir
Group dynamics change. Choirs develop their own personalities as singers improve and relationships evolve. Sometimes the choir you think you’re leading no longer exists. If you cling to an outdated image of what the choir should be, disappointment can seep in and morale will fall.
Solution
Work with the choir you actually have, not the one you
imagine or wish for. Leadership begins with seeing what is really in front of
you. See
Work with what you’ve got and not how you want the world to be.
A natural end?
Not all decline is failure. Nothing lasts forever, and all groups eventually reach a point where it makes sense to stop. Energy fades, circumstances change, and the choir may simply have run its course.
Sometimes the most honest and healthy decision is to recognise that ending well is better than dragging on indefinitely.
Together, these two parts offer a way of diagnosing what might be happening when a choir starts to struggle — and, just as importantly, a reminder that decline is not always something to fight at any cost. Sometimes it can be reversed. Sometimes it needs managing. And sometimes it needs accepting.
Chris Rowbury
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