Our chairman River King writes:
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
For a long time I had wished there was a choir in Kingsbridge I wanted to join, but I never imagined it would be me that initiated it. Having recently celebrated my 80th birthday I was looking forward to a fairly quiet and peaceful year to come.
Then one day just before Christmas 2023 I saw a flyer for a drop-in singing session in Totnes . On impulse I emailed the leader, Ruairi Edwards, asking if he would come and teach in Kingsbridge. He replied yes, and said let's talk about it in the new year.
We met in early January when I went to Ruairi's class in Totnes which was very inspiring and I knew at once that he would be the perfect leader for a Kingsbridge choir. Afterwards I sugggested that if he would look after the singing I would do the admin. I simply assumed we might get a dozen or so people interested. We chatted and agreed to give it a go.
We settled for 23rd January to run a taster session at the Kingsbridge Care Hub, to see if anyone would be interested. I asked a few friends to put out notices on Facebook and sat down to wait, expecting maybe 10 to 15 people.
FIRST MEETING
The shock came when I found we had 45 people booked to come, which was the maximum for the venue, and more people were turned away. Luckily I had asked for help on the door so Ali Denham and Helen Petit were there to manage the rush while Ruairi and I set up the chairs in the room.
The evening was electric, and we were amazed at the sounds and harmonies we made so quickly. Ruairi's teaching and conducting was so stimulating, far from many people's experiences of choirs in the past.
That was an extraordinary experience. I had put so little energy into getting it to happen; it was as if I had just opened a door and people came pouring in. But I had no inkling of how much of my life would be taken up over the coming months in trying to get it all organised
In the following days, after hasty calls to several other venues I finally found the 6th form lounge at Kingsbridge Community college. This venue was much bigger and at our second meeting we had 60 singers.
ON THE DOOR
Exciting as this was, it was a real problem for us on the door, having to collect cash payments from everyone as well as email addresses for future contact.
At that session we asked for volunteers to help and several people came forward. Since then Ali has taken on the role of Volunteer co-ordinator and has a rota of people to welcome singers at the door and collect payments. Now we couldn't do without them.
The bank account took a few weeks to open, but after a few hiccups and lost mail it is now working well.
But with such a large group we realised we needed to be more organised and would need a website. I asked for loans from the choir to enable us to pay for this and buy a card reader so we could take payments by card. Three generous choir members offered and I accepted loan offers of a total of £750.
MAILING LISTS
I was struggling to communicate with the ever increasing number of enquiries on my computer at home and I soon realised we urgently needed a better mailing system. This was confirmed to me when Google refused to send out my latest message to the mailing list saying they suspected it was spam.
By that time there were over a hundred names on the mailing list and I could not keep track of who was coming when. I realised I could not continue like this and needed help
MORE HELP
Fortunately at that time another singer, Helen Hirst, came up and said she could help with the finances and organisation. It was like music to my ears when she said she was happy using XL spreadsheets and would set up a system for keeping records. And true to her word she has sorted through our old attendance sheets and we are now getting a much better understanding of it all.
She was followed by Sarah Game who also offered to help. So now we have an amazing steering group of four of us, and the pressure is definitely easing. I can see that in a little while we will have a good working system and know what is going on. I'm confident that as well as having an enthusiastic choir of ongoing singers we will be able to keep good records and balance the books. It seems like the choir is really getting under way.
HOW IT ALL BEGAN
For a long time I had wished there was a choir in Kingsbridge I wanted to join, but I never imagined it would be me that initiated it. Having recently celebrated my 80th birthday I was looking forward to a fairly quiet and peaceful year to come.
Then one day just before Christmas 2023 I saw a flyer for a drop-in singing session in Totnes . On impulse I emailed the leader, Ruairi Edwards, asking if he would come and teach in Kingsbridge. He replied yes, and said let's talk about it in the new year.
We met in early January when I went to Ruairi's class in Totnes which was very inspiring and I knew at once that he would be the perfect leader for a Kingsbridge choir. Afterwards I sugggested that if he would look after the singing I would do the admin. I simply assumed we might get a dozen or so people interested. We chatted and agreed to give it a go.
We settled for 23rd January to run a taster session at the Kingsbridge Care Hub, to see if anyone would be interested. I asked a few friends to put out notices on Facebook and sat down to wait, expecting maybe 10 to 15 people.
FIRST MEETING
The shock came when I found we had 45 people booked to come, which was the maximum for the venue, and more people were turned away. Luckily I had asked for help on the door so Ali Denham and Helen Petit were there to manage the rush while Ruairi and I set up the chairs in the room.
The evening was electric, and we were amazed at the sounds and harmonies we made so quickly. Ruairi's teaching and conducting was so stimulating, far from many people's experiences of choirs in the past.
That was an extraordinary experience. I had put so little energy into getting it to happen; it was as if I had just opened a door and people came pouring in. But I had no inkling of how much of my life would be taken up over the coming months in trying to get it all organised
In the following days, after hasty calls to several other venues I finally found the 6th form lounge at Kingsbridge Community college. This venue was much bigger and at our second meeting we had 60 singers.
ON THE DOOR
Exciting as this was, it was a real problem for us on the door, having to collect cash payments from everyone as well as email addresses for future contact.
At that session we asked for volunteers to help and several people came forward. Since then Ali has taken on the role of Volunteer co-ordinator and has a rota of people to welcome singers at the door and collect payments. Now we couldn't do without them.
The bank account took a few weeks to open, but after a few hiccups and lost mail it is now working well.
But with such a large group we realised we needed to be more organised and would need a website. I asked for loans from the choir to enable us to pay for this and buy a card reader so we could take payments by card. Three generous choir members offered and I accepted loan offers of a total of £750.
MAILING LISTS
I was struggling to communicate with the ever increasing number of enquiries on my computer at home and I soon realised we urgently needed a better mailing system. This was confirmed to me when Google refused to send out my latest message to the mailing list saying they suspected it was spam.
By that time there were over a hundred names on the mailing list and I could not keep track of who was coming when. I realised I could not continue like this and needed help
MORE HELP
Fortunately at that time another singer, Helen Hirst, came up and said she could help with the finances and organisation. It was like music to my ears when she said she was happy using XL spreadsheets and would set up a system for keeping records. And true to her word she has sorted through our old attendance sheets and we are now getting a much better understanding of it all.
She was followed by Sarah Game who also offered to help. So now we have an amazing steering group of four of us, and the pressure is definitely easing. I can see that in a little while we will have a good working system and know what is going on. I'm confident that as well as having an enthusiastic choir of ongoing singers we will be able to keep good records and balance the books. It seems like the choir is really getting under way.
