Our Objectives.
The Choir objectives are:-
A commitment to practice and improved choral singing.
To provide concerts and/or entertainments in support of charities or worthy causes.
To ensure pleasure to audiences through spirited and enjoyable performances.
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General Information.
The Village Singers has been in existence for 17 years and have been performing in South Derbyshire and South West Nottinghamshire during that time.
Anyone interested in joining the Choir would be made very welcome.
Practices are held at St. Michael's Church Hall which is located next to St. Michael's Church, in the centre of the village (DE72 3DZ) on Thursday evenings from 7:30pm to 9:00pm. See the Map on the Contact Us page.
There are usually vacancies in all parts (i.e. Soprano, Alto, Tenor and Bass). The ability to read music is not an absolute requirement and there is no formal audition.
If you would wish to join us, if over 18, then, either turn up at practice or Contact Us.
If before any commitment, you wish to see how the choir operates then you are welcome to sit and observe a practice or practices.
Our History.
'The Village Singers is a local amateur choir of mixed voices. We were founded in January 2007 following a project in 2006 to produce a CD of Christmas music for the villages of Breaston and Draycott and those involved had so much enjoyed the experience that a few of us decided to form a choir; and so 'The Village Singers' was born.
We began to rehearse in January 2007 with a membership of approximately 28. Our conductor at this time, was Adele Spencer and under her guidance we performed our first concert at St Chad's Church, Wilne in Apri1 2007. This was very well received and we continued to rehearse for our second concert, also at St Chad's, in December of that year. Jean Griffiths was our accompanist in these early days.
Since then we have had 2 changes of conductor/musical director, namely Michelle Cassidy who joined us in 2008 and our present MD, Stuart Graham, who took over in January 2018. Our present accompanist is Abigail Parker who joined us in 2021. Our membership has fluctuated but we still have about 25 - 30 regular members. Over the years we have been engaged for weddings and charitable events as well as regular concerts.
Our repertoire is varied and appeals to a range of musical tastes: we include Songs from the shows, popular melodies and many traditional classics. Proceeds from most of our concerts are donated to local charities.