We are a group of amateur singers, from all walks of life and all ages, who have one thing in common: we love to create beautiful four-part harmony by singing in the a cappella style. We meet every Thursday at Francis Road, Ashford, and sing a broad range of songs from Elvis to Uncle Kracker, chosen because the beautiful chords we can produce that will bring a smile to our enthusiastic Musical Director’s face.
We jokingly call ourselves a “chorus transitioning,” because we started some 10 years ago as an all-male chorus and enjoyed some wonderful success in the Kent area entertaining various groups and helping to raise money for charities. These include the Pilgrim's Hospice for which we staged several variety shows.
In 2018 we won the Best Choir competition at the Hastings Music Festival, which we were thrilled about. Furthermore a group of our singers formed a separate, mixed voices, octet by joining up with 3 women singers and they won the a cappella section of the competition.
"Okay, so why transitioning?”, you may ponder. Well our competition success inspired us to invite women to join us and become a mixed chorus. After all, we do sing in the barbershop style which enables men and women to sing in the same sections of a chorus, creating a beautiful blend of voices. This differs from classical choirs, where singers are grouped as soprano, alto, tenor and bass.
We want to be a chorus which is known for its friendliness, its diversity and its commitment to having fun; reaching higher levels of harmony singing.
We are members of BABS, the British Association of Barbershop Singers. BABS has also been working hard at promoting mixed choruses and Lindley, our esteemed Musical Director, sings in BABS national mixed chorus competitions. We get a lot of support from BABS. They run a summer school at Nottingham University each year and members of our chorus attend to enjoy the beer, the craic … and also tutoring from coaches with international status. Lindley also attends a workshop for Musical Directors each year and returns with fresh ideas to apply to our rehearsal.
