How does it work?
- Firstly, choose the group you’d like to join (Halesworth: Mon evening, Long Melford: Mon evening, Ipswich (West): Tue evening, Kesgrave: Wed morning, Ipswich (Central): Wed evening, Felixstowe: Thu morning, Stowmarket: Thu evening or Framlingham: Thu evening – see Home page for venue details) and come along for a free taster session with no obligation to join. The choirs welcome new singers to attend any week in the first month of term – next term starts in September. If you decide to join Pop Chorus, you then pay £82.50 for the term (concessions available) and come along to weekly rehearsals.
- You may already know what kind of voice you have or we can make a guess! Singers are loosely divided into tops, middles and bottoms, and you always have the option to move parts if you find what you’re singing a bit uncomfortable or a stretch.
- Sessions start with voice and breath exercises and warm ups – gently waking up and stretching voices to the tops and bottoms of everyone’s range.
- Pop Chorus Director (Yula) chooses which songs we sing, with lots of suggestions coming from the singers. She then arranges them into harmony parts which will suit the voices in the group and teach them in rehearsals by ear (ie she’ll sing it to you and you sing it back), all the parts are then put together and everyone smiles as they realise what a fabulous sound they’re making! These sessions are backed up by recordings which you can download from the members area of this website – usually of all the parts together and also a version with your part louder over all the rest so you can practise at home or in the car if you want to.
- We all go home smiling, singing, buzzing, joyous and uplifted!
Terms and performances
We work in 3 terms each year, these start in September, January and after Easter and run for between 10-13 weeks (average 12 weeks). We sometimes put on informal concerts for friends and family to come and watch and we regularly perform at local events. The past couple of years have seen us sell out Ipswich Corn Exchange, perform at Latitude, sing our chart single Always at Portman Road and perform in the inaugural First Light festival in Lowestoft.
You can view some of these performances on our Youtube channel – click button below;
Come and try a session for free – or contact Yula on 07788 585441, or email sing@test2020.popchorus.co.uk for more information.