The Choir That Rocks - or just jiggles about a bit - Part 2

Having got over the disappointment of 'The Choir That Rocks' - or as the Daily Mirror calls it, 'The Choir That Sucks', not the Choir itself, just the documentary, and I couldn't really argue with that, I was interested to see if it pulled its socks up for Part 2. They stayed resolutely around its ankles with the odd foray up to just below knee level.

This episode was to feature the Farnham 'Teen' Choir who I had seen perform at Wembley (well,  you all know we got there so not much point pretending!).  I was knocked out by Rachel O' Brien, who sang 'You've Got the Love' by Florence and the Machine to rapturous applause.  That such a great voice could come from a teenager was amazing. So I was a little bit miffed to discover that she's actually 22 and a university graduate.  It seemed to be stretching the idea of a 'Teen Choir' just a little bit far.  There are lots of new Teen Choirs being set up all across the country. The age range states 11-20. Hmm, so why, I have to ask myself, is someone who is clearly too old for a teen choir taking the starring role in the documentary?

And my dears, the producers must have just about peed their pants when they discovered that not only can the girl sing but she's got a heart condition too! And one, incidentally, that Hugh Bonneville can't seem to get right. He called it Vasovogal Syndrome. It's actually called Vasovagal Synchope, a synchope being a medical name for a faint.  It's not, strictly speaking, a heart condition, rather a malfunction in the autonomic part of the nervous system that regulates the flow of blood to the body. It causes a drop in blood pressure and slowing of the heartbeat and then you faint.  It's not lifethreatening, just bloody annoying, but the producers, and Rachel herself were not about to let that stand in the way of a bit of dramatic telly. 

Most VS sufferers have a trigger that brings on an attack according to a friend who suffers from it. Rachel's was clearly a very rare one as it came on every time a TV camera was pointed at her.  We were treated to a 'beauty shot' of  'all the drugs she has to take to control it' but a quick freeze frame revealed that they seemed to be all the same drug, Fludrocortisone, which is prescribed to anyone with what is called orthostatic intolerance (just see how much you're learning!)  - basically if you stand upright too long, you faint - and what looked suspiciously like vitamin tablets. I'm not trying to make light of her condition but I can't deny that by the end of it I was mutteringr rather unkindly "Just faint for God's sake and get it over with' every time she fluttered her hand and commented on her heart 'going funny'.

My own choir featured far more so it was fun to see who got a close up and who was going the wrong way in the dance moves (Steve, you know who you are!). The sudden appearance of one of our soloists fronting the Stroud Rock Choir was a bit strange. As far as I know, she only goes to ours.  It gave me a creeping sense of unease, that the documentary was not, in fact, being very honest.

This was further compounded by the secondary story of whether or not Rachel would sing well enough for 'The Man from Universal' to be whisked off to record her 'first' solo at the Abbey Road studios and thus realise her dream of becoming a recording star.  We all knew she'd do it, she does have a wonderful voice but when I did a quick Google of her to find out her surname, having missed it on the documentary, I discovered that she has already sung solo on Rock Choir's first album. (Track 5 apparently, in case you actually care). So the big 'will she/won't she' get to sing solo was just another bit of not entirely honest telly.

So it's the final instalment tonight, and I think it will be the best one. The whole Wembley thing was absolutely fabulous and I hope the cameras manage to really capture the atmosphere. I'm looking forward to hearing how we all sounded together. When you are sitting in one voice section it's quite difficult to hear what the whole thing sounds like. 

The single 'Something Inside So Strong' from the (my!) new album goes on download release at 10pm tonight.  It will be available on iTunes for a mere 99p.  Please would you buy it and ask all your friends to as well. The live track we recorded at Wembley is Track 20. All the royalties go to Refuge, and goodness knows they could do with it.  With a fair wind it might even go to the top of the download charts which would mean I could (almost) honestly put No 1 recording star on my CV, which is in itself as much a work of fiction as this whole documentary thingy.

Apparently Caroline is in discussions with the Olympic Games Committee about Rock Choir performing at the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics. That would be pretty amazing. Watch this space!



The one in which I become a recording star.... oh, and a Guinness World Record holder

Not bad for a Sunday afternoon eh? 

Finally, the days spent driving the children mad with random 'ooh, ooh's' and 'aaahhhs' with the odd 'eh oh'  and 'do doo' thrown in were coming to an end. The dance moves were more or less learnt and I was on the coach to Wembley for Rock Choir Live.

It was amazing, incredible, emotional and lots of other adjectives. I won't go and get too sappy on you, I promise but it was a wonderful experience and one I will remember for a long time. I've been lucky enough to have some great experiences in my life; ballooning over the Masai Mara, standing on the escarpment overlooking the Great Rift Valley, swimming with giant turtles in Barbados, wreck diving in the Caribbean but this was up there with all of them.  If you want to know the real definition of  'a wall of sound' it's  8000 voices singing in harmony - or more or less! Let's not forget my fellow tuneless choir member from earlier posts. When people express surprise at my moving back from France I tell them it's because I want to live my life, not exist in it, and this is what I meant. I want to have these amazing experiences. The 14th July fete couldn't really compare with this, nice though it was. Interestingly there are two other people who are French refugees like myself in the choir and we all felt the same.

We arrived at the Arena at midday.  It was chaos, but happy, expectant chaos.  Hard as we tried, we all got separated in the crowds so just had to hope we would be able to sit together when we got in.  I've only been a choir member for a few months and ours is one of the newest ones to be performing at Wembley. I was the only upper alto on our coach and everyone else was sitting in a different block and so I'd resigned myself to sitting on my own, well, as on my own as I could be among 10,500 people, but by a stroke of luck I found myself being directed to a seat next to Sue, Annette and Lynne from my own choir. Hooray! Safety in numbers and at the very least, more experience members who could push me in the right direction if my swaying and snapping went awry.

The atmoshere was uplifting, exciting and the anticipation was almost palpable.  People waved madly at friends and family, trying to attract their attention, the TV cameras whizzed around filming people for the documentary which comes out next month, microphones were shoved in people's faces for a bit of on the spot reaction and the Mexican Waves came and went with increasing regularity. The posh ones from off of London (as they say in Brizzle) had their iPads charged up ready to catch every moment. I had my ageing Sony point-and-shoot which proved not up to the task as you will discover from the lack of videos taken by my own fair hand.

It seemed hours before the show started, slightly late because an entire choir had been delayed by a road accident just outside London but when it did, it started with a bang. The Rock Choir leaders performed 'Let Me Entertain You'. I think Robbie would have been proud.

I'm not going to give a blow by blow account of what we sang but here are some videos of my favourite moments.

'Valerie'

'River Deep Mountain High'

Dancing in the Street

There was much whispering about who the special guests would be. Of course, we hoped for Robbie (Let Me Entertain You), Elton John or George Michael (see later) but instead we got this shower....

A motley collection of Rock Choir widowers, brothers, boyfriends and dads who had been rehearsing in secret to sing for their partners. They were totally fabulous and will no  doubt savour the one day in their lives when they had 8000 women screaming for them. 

The next mystery guests were not so much of a mystery, having been revealed by someone on their Facebook page. It was George Michael and Elton John, Yay 'The Soldiers' who Rock Choir supported on their last tour.

The final mystery guest was a bit of a wild card, an opera singer better known for his irritating television adverts. I was a bit confused as Rock Choir doesn't do any classical singing. When he was announced, there was an audible groan but he turned out to be a very funny man and soon had everyone warming to him. He was, of course, Mr Gio Compare himself, Wynne Evans. - and not nearly as annoying as his alter ego.

On a more serious note, because it wasn't just about having fun, Rock Choir supports two charities, Refuge and Missing People. Martin Houghton Brown, the Chief Executive of  Missing People came on stage first. We'd all previously been handed a poster of a missing person. We were all asked to hold the posters up for a photo opportunity for the charity.  We were told that each year in the UK 120,000 people go missing. Of those the vast majority turn up safely but 10,000 don't. Look around at the choir and audience at Wembley. That's 10,500 people. Just about each one of them represents a person who has gone missing in the UK in the last year. How shocki!ng is that?  As we held our posters up, I imagined how those families must be feeling. It was very emotional, so much so that Mr Houghton Brown had to leave the stage. The photo has been reproduced widely in the local press but sadly a certain French politician with a big ego and stunted willy sense of what is acceptable proved more interesting to the nationals. Bloody Frenchman, always messing things up!

My missing person is Jamie Cheeseman, who went missing in 1993 at the age of 16. For 18 years her family have been wondering what happened to her. Can you imagine?  This is Jamie as she might look today.

Rock Choir has been involved with Refuge for some time. All royalties from our recording of 'Something Inside So Strong', Labi Siffre's anti-apartheid anthem, go to Refuge who have adopted it as their official song. If you don't know the words, read them. We heard that in the UK each week 12 women die as a result of domestic violence, two killed by their partners and the remainder take their own lives. Yet the top four women's charities in the UK receive only a third of the donations of The Donkey Sanctuary. It's a very worthwhile charity but, come on!  Universal Records were going to use the even to record a live version of  'Something Inside So Strong' for the new Rock Choir album. Here it is.

Then we had to sing it without the lead vocals which gave a fantastic idea of the sound the choir was making

So there you have it. I'm officially a recording artist. Oh, and a Guinness World Record holder. Rock Choir became, officially, the largest recording act in the Universe, or maybe it was the UK.

And just to prove it's not all for 'femmes d'un certain age' the Rock Choir Teen choir has been launched and it's hoped that more will be set up over the next few years

Watch out for the soloist in the last song. She got a standing ovation and promptly burst into tears. Recording contract to follow I'm pretty sure.

So, the day was nearly over, there had been laughter, tears... and of course a loony. Sitting next to me. Why me?  There were 10,500 people in Wembley Arena and she was sitting next to me, invading my personal space, giving me her life story, a running commentary on her parents' progress from Brizzle to Wembley. "So where are your choir?" I asked hopefully.  "I can't find any of them" she replied. Not bloody surprised I thought rather uncharitably.

It was time to finish in Rock Choir tradition with a hearty rendition of Joyful, Joyful which had sounded anything but joyful at our last rehearsal.  Still, one thing I learned during the day is that when you sing with 7,999 others you can't hear yourself, never mind anyone else so our error-strewn version wouldn't really matter.  As it was it sounded pretty good, even if I do say so myself.

But not only that, I've had a horrible, annoying cough for the past 7 years (yes I do mean years). No doctors have managed to cure it but after 4 months of Rock Choir it's almost gone. So on top of everything, Rock Choir can heal the sick!

So how did your weekend go?

Ooops, I forgot our Robbie Williams moment....