More than 150 people had a melodious day at the 4th annual Dorset Community Choir Festival at Herrison Hall, Charlton Down on Sunday 2nd November. The event celebrated the growth of unaccompanied harmony singing acrossDorset, with attendees learning songs at singing workshops in the afternoon followed by a concert.
As this year is the centenary of World War 1, we had a focus of Peace and Remembrance for this year’s festival. One of the songs we sang in the concert was ‘Only Remembered’, featured in the stage play ‘Warhorse’. We gained permission to use this song for our event as an outreach element of the ‘Truce Choir project’ in theNorth WestofEnglandwhich celebrates the famous WW1 Christmas Truce of 1914.
Community choirs and singers from across Dorsettook part and volunteers from Portland’s own community choir, IslandVoices, helped to run the event. A ‘Big Sing’ during the afternoon was led by choir leaders Su Lewis, Sammy Hurden, Juliet Harwood and Jon Conway, and an early evening concert gave local community choirs a chance to showcase songs from their own repertoire.
The following choirs and singing groups performed in the concert:
· Bagatelle from Weymouth
· Bridport Voices based in Bridport
· The Quangle Wangle Choir fromWeymouth
· The Sing for Water Choir – Weymouth and Dorchester
· Island Voices from Portland
· Local Vocals which is an amalgamation of seven groups which meet regularly in Bridport, Dorchester, Poole, Winterborne Whitchurch, Wimborne, Wool, and Stoborough
Island Voices Choir leader Su Lewis said ‘It was exhilarating but also very moving to sing together with so many people, particularly with the focus on peace and remembrance. The wonderful sound we made raised the rafters and moved some to tears! We were also very impressed by the high calibre of all the choir performances in the concert. Each year the bar is raised as the quality gets better and better.’
Su Lewis
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