Choirs are blazing like wildfire in our patch - literally hundreds of local people are joining them. Berkshire author Gill Hornby has even found that community choirs, rock choirs, gospel choirs and jazz choirs are great fodder for a novel. In her book: “All Together Now”, she casts a lively bunch of characters who recognise that the one thing that might brighten up their lacklustre town is a sense of community pride, something they’ve lost. Their high street is half empty with too many businesses closing down and the place seems to have lots its heart. Until, that is, they get together to start singing. Then some find love, a new life, happiness and harmony!
A very good friend of mine found love when she joined a community choir in London. Yet others who regularly pop in to my BBC Radio Berkshire show extol the virtues of joining a choir. Gill reckons that, in the olden days, we used to unconsciously bond as a community by gathering every Sunday in church and singing together as part of a religious service. Now few and fewer people go to church, it’s something we don’t even know we’re missing - but we are. And that void is now being filled with the sudden explosion of community choirs. She reckons community singing is a profound human need - and I agree! Local choirs are a huge force in our society and I’ve never met anyone who doesn’t crow about them!
