Organisers want to “get the community together” through the launch of the choir
THE LLANDAFF North Community Choir has launched this week as locals wanted a new choir after the pandemic stopped the previous group.
The choir had its first practice on Monday evening at The Railway Hotel, Station Road. People came from across Cardiff to join in with warm-ups and harmonies.
The choir is meeting for an initial five weeks to get an idea of how many people are interested and to see how it goes.
Delyth Drew, a statistician local to Llandaff North, is one of the people launching the choir.
The 42-year-old said: “There’s been a few people going ‘oh wouldn’t it be nice to have a choir’ so we thought well let’s try it, see if we can set it up again.”
The choir hosted a taster session last year and a carol evening just before Christmas, which was a hit with locals.
“We did a little Facebook thing and then we organised a carol evening here in the pub and it was so busy you couldn’t even move,” Ms Drew said.
“It was really fantastic. So, I know a couple of people who are musicians and choir people so they co-ordinated the whole evening for us. A lovely kind of festive evening.”
After the success of the carol evening, Ms Drew wanted to keep the momentum up.
“We just thought let’s keep it going and see if we can get the choir back up and running,” she said.
Ms Drew was a member of the area’s previous choir, but the group did not reunite after the pandemic.
She explained: “We did used to have a choir, years ago now. We started off originally doing it for a Christmas lights switch-on and we had a lot of people.
“I think we carried on for about two years and then the numbers slowly dropped and then Covid hit and then we never got back together.”
Small performances could be in the choir’s future, but Ms Drew is more focused on getting the community together to sing.
“Everyone’s reasons for coming are different but for me it was just about can we get the community together and just have some fun really,” Ms Drew said.
Celia Webb, the choir’s singing leader, takes a holistic approach to singing and is not worried about perfecting individual voices.
The 57-year-old said: “My biggest love in life is getting a whole group of people singing.
“I really love the natural voice approach of treating us as a village or as a group of people. We’re focusing on the confidence, the joy, the wellbeing and the amazing sound that always happens with a group of people.”
Ms Webb believes that singing in a group is beneficial to mental health.
“An enormous amount of work has been done on the health and mental health benefits of singing and all of the benefits that we get from singing are multiplied hugely by singing in a group,” she said.
“The social time is very important because it’s about connection, it’s about life-to-life connection, about the release of endorphins, the release of our voices.”
- The choir is meeting at The Railway Hotel, Llandaff North at 7.30pm on Monday nights until February 13. You can find more information on the choir’s Facebook page.
