17 years ago I led one of my first residential singing weekends. The theme was the Beach Boys.
Beach Boys singing weekend, September 2009, Farncombe Estate
The other weekend, I was in Derbyshire leading another of my (rare) Beach Boys weekends. It got me thinking about all the things that have happened since 2009.
Three of the singers who came in 2009 also came to my recent weekend. Apart from the obvious — we all looked 17 years older! — what else has changed?
Here are seven things that came up for me.
-
I’ve got better at what I do — although I still get very nervous
before leading a singing workshop, I notice that I am more proficient and
relaxed, and can teach songs more effectively (as well as deal with any
problems that might arise)
-
More people are interested in singing together these days — my
residential weekends regularly sell out. When I ran my first one, it just
about broke even. When I joined the
Natural Voice Network
back in 2001, there were around 60 members, and I knew them all. Now there
are around 800, many of whom lead a regular choir.
-
I’m grateful that singers keep coming back to my events — I get a lot
of repeat business and don’t have to do that much publicity. I don’t take it
for granted, but I’m very grateful that people seem to like what I offer.
-
Beach Boys songs a cappella are hard! — I always say that pop
songs are hard. For these weekends, I insist that people have considerable
experience of harmony singing. Even then, the singers find it hard. That’s
because we all misremember the melodies and lyrics, and we tend to
know the tunes so well that we find the harmonies a challenge. Also, singing
a cappella means that we don’t have the instrumental backing as a
guide.
-
I still prefer one-offs to regular choirs — I teach quickly because
people can learn faster than they think, but also because it helps singers
not get bogged down in mind chatter. I often say “Your mouth knows more than
your brain”. At the end of a one-off workshop, the songs are usually pretty
much there.
If it were a regular weekly choir, we would go over the song again the next week. Then it would start to fall apart as people began to think more. So we would need to go over it again the following week and the week after that. Finally, we would get it back to the state it was in when we first learnt it. At one-offs we can avoid all that.
-
Singing workshops are energising — I’m in my 70s now and do find a
long weekend, with the associated travel, more and more tiring. However,
when I’m in the midst of teaching and hearing the wonderful harmonies come
back to me, I’m super energised. I forget all my cares, aches, pains and
tiredness, and get carried along by the energy of singing together.
-
I still don’t think choirs should sing pop songs — I’ve not changed
my mind since I wrote
Why choirs shouldn’t sing pop songs. I do offer pop songs workshops occasionally, but I choose the songs very,
very carefully and insist that they’re for experienced singers only.
Here’s to the next 17 years!
Chris Rowbury
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