Anyone watching BBC Breakfast on Monday 17th May just before 8am were in for a real treat: the combined voices of members of the National Youth Choir of Scotland. What was all the more amazing about this performance was that the singers had learnt their parts entirely via Zoom and only came together to sing for the first time in 14 months at 5am that morning!
The singers were directed by the NYCoS founder, Christopher Bell and were singing outdoors on Calton Hill, Edinburgh. The chosen song, ‘You Raise Me Up’ beautifully reflected the feeling of singing together and the sound from the choir was astonishing, particularly considering their time apart. It was a joy to read down the comments on the Tweet from BBC Breakfast, and you can see these here:
There remains anxiety amongst choir leaders as we enter step 3 of the Road Map out of Lockdown, but to see a wonderful example of choral singing presented so beautifully on national television is a great source of solace and encouragement as professional music leaders and their amateur singers and players continue to wait for the government guidance from the DCMS to appear. To still be waiting for this on the day of the latest change is disappointing to say the least, but par for the course from a Department that released guidance for the 12th April changes on Wednesday 14th April.
Project Get Singing’s advice to choir leaders is to keep going. Make your plans and go with them, and in the absence of a ‘don’t’, ‘do’!