Organisations have fixed calendar points. Things to work to. Five year plans that are underpinned by monthly meetings and weekly deadlines. Like music, there is rhythm. New Mill Male Voice Choir is no different. Our overarching rhythm lasts twelve months. It is not a business rhythm, being more in tune with the seasons; the ebb and flow of brown leaves, grey skies, crisp dews and fields of rape seed oil, from which we come up for air every month or so to breathe in the heady atmosphere of performance. Or, prosaically, we leave the shelter of New Mill Club to sing in a concert. Our current fixed points are Christmas, January, Spring Bank, and the Summer break, peaking a the October Town Hall concert with star guests. We have other engagements when we ourselves are the guests. Mostly fund-raisers, these concerts can recur but many do not.
Almost since our inception we have guested in December at Low Moor, Bradford, once Allied Colloids and now BASF. Our members who spent their working lives with the company provided the original link which, despite the inevitable losses with time, feels to get firmer each year. We usually sing at nearby Holy Trinity, but due to structural issues last year, we had to switch to the works canteen. We share the stage with local primary schools so the audience is substantial, and it’s still pretty good after the calls for bedtime. Anyway, these young choirs give our musical director an excuse to wear a silly outfit. There are two lady vicars, jolly and serious, and there always used to be a bloke from the company who sang Home Sweet Home.
The Scarborough rehearsal weekend used to be in Llandudno, but it moved some years ago. Whilst they share seaside viewpoints and marauding seagulls, Scarborough has the edge on challenging weather. Cold offshore gale-sized wind to be precise, along with icy pavements and impenetrable fog banks. Thankfully not all at once. As the musical work and fun progress within the safety of the hotel, excursions may be limited to the most hardy. New songs are introduced and older ones are spruced up. Those individuals who love the adulation of the mob get chances to hone their acts, both in reserved slots during rehearsal and as part of a gala night that we put on at the Highlander Hotel on South Cliff. We have occasionally broken the journey home with concert performances, notably at the Riley Smith Hall, Tadcaster and Helmsley Arts Centre. It’s a weekend when the bonds between choir members grow, and, given you can’t know everyone, new bonds are created. Christmas is a convenient start. Our annual pilgrimage to Christ Church is an opportunity for the New Mill community to join with their male voice choir in a mix of popular and seasonal musical items. We can all then decant to New Mill Club for eats, drinks and some pretty decent informal singing. That’s shorthand for choir members doing their ‘turns’. These are men who can remember their words and just love the adulation of the mob. It’s our Christmas party.
Spring Bank is the time when we go on tour. Festivals of music beyond our familiar meadows, during which our sound actually gets better, unlike the performance of your average touring rugby or cricket team. A short list of highlights from our visits include Tintoretto’s church in Venice, world heritage site Český Krumlov in the Czech Republic, Pablo Casals museum, Barcelona, Auschwitz and the Chopin Institute in Poland and The Menin Gate in Ypres. Flanders. The guys still talk about the Roman Arena at Verona where we did an impromptu performance of The Anvil Chorus, accompanied by workers on hammers and steel girders who were building the set for the opera Aida.
