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Dear Choir Leader or Choir Administrator
Thank you so much for your interest in the Sing Away Community Choir Festival and your patience in waiting for the details.
Originally the date was set as 6th May 2023. You can imagine our feelings when the coronation was announced to also take place on this date. It was decided by the team that it was not possible to continue with this date for various reasons.
Thankfully all of the song leaders for the day were able to commit to Sunday 7th May 2023 and this is now the date!
We had a City Centre venue for the original date but unfortunately we were unable to secure it for the new date due to other bookings.
We have managed to secure an amazing venue, still in Birmingham, which is perfect for our needs. It is not in the City Centre but has great public transport links and local parking.
The venue is Sutton Coldfield Town Hall! It is a beautiful building with a beautiful ballroom perfect for singing and we are hoping to fill it with 300+ singers all singing in glorious a capella harmony.
The song leaders for the day are Bruce Knight, Carl Hodson, Sarah Masters and Louise Blackburn. They are all exceptionally experienced choir leaders and workshop leaders working within the Natural Voice Network style.
We plan to teach a range of songs throughout the day from a range of different genres. During the lunch break there will be opportunities for choirs to busk and share some of their repertoire. After learning so many glorious songs we will have an informal concert where choirs can share a song on stage in the glorious town hall should they wish. Performing in the concert is optional and choirs who don't want to perform won't be disadvantaged in the application process. All singing in the concert is again to be unaccompanied a cappella singing.
We will finish the day with one last sing together of some of the songs we have learnt during the day. I can promise the day with be heart-warming, joyous and a celebration of unaccompanied harmony singing and community.
The planned timetable for the day is as follows (this is obviously subject to change but it won’t differ much)
From 9.30am Registration
10am – 11.15am Welcome, Warm Up and Session 1
Break
11.35am – 12.35pm Session 2
Lunch Break
1.30 -2.30pm Session 3
Break and Rehearsals for Choir Concert
3.15pm Concert
4-15pm Final collective singing session
BOOKING INFORMATION
The festival is open to all non-auditioned community choirs who are happy to come and enjoy a day of a cappella singing. Tickets for the festival are £25 each and we are pleased to offer a free place for each choir leader. Bookings are to be made through the choir leader or a designated choir administrator. The booking form is on this link BOOKING FORM LINK and will be open till the 25th November 2022. There is no rush. Please just ensure you have filled it in by the 25th November 2022.
Please fill the form in with your choir name and expected number of attendees. You will be informed by the 28/11/22 of your place. We will then invoice for an initial deposit of £10 per attendee. Final payments for the festival will be due by the end of February 2023. If we have more applications than places we will use a random selection method where possible.
The festival is being run by Sing Away CIC as a not for profit event. All profits from the day will be used to bring singing to people of all ages from across the region.
We are so excited to bring back an A capella festival to the Midlands and we are sure the day will be a success and become an annual event!
If you have any questions then please do not hesitate to email us on singawaycic@gmail.com or take a look at the website www.singaway.co.uk
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this email and we really hope to see you in May 2023!
Kindest regards
Louise and Sarah and Emma
Sing Away CIC
Organisers of the Sing Away Community Choir Festival