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Alan Cooper sings the praises of the Cornish male voice choirs

My mind goes back to an autumn evening nearly 40 years ago. I was a singing member of the then famous Treviscoe Male Voice Choir, in the days when Russell Kessell was the musical director and his wife Melba was accompanist. We had been singing in Barnstaple; a concert that went well, with a large and receptive audience. As the coach made its way through the lanes towards home, the men dozing, there would come from somewhere a voice, joined by more, like spontaneous combustion. A song would develop and grow, then die away. A while later it would happen again, from some other part of the coach. As the journey progressed and the men grew more tired, the pitch of the singing would get lower and lower. The songs were, usually, old and trusty hymn tunes.

This is the key to where the singing in male voice choirs came from. Many of the men had grown up in villages where the chapel was the centre of life, where the singing of hymns was normal, essential. They would know every word, every tune, and if they didn’t know the harmonies, they would make it up. Without realising it, music was in their blood.

At my last rough count I have located 57 male choirs in the Duchy of Cornwall, ranging from a hefty 80 plus down to a simple dozen or so. From Bude to Cape Cornwall, from Newquay to Saltash, men come together to sing for the sheer love of it. Some have been going for many decades, some have started up very recently. The reason for choirs forming seems to be a very personal one, where a few men get together, dig out pieces of music from the cupboard and see what happens.

Tintagel Orpheus Male Voice Choir started way back in 1929 when one Jack Thomas came from Wales - where else with a name like that - to quarry slate, started the choir and remained conductor until 1955. Four Lanes Male Choir, now over 60 years old, has until recently been under the batons of father and son. Ron Brown, the son, relinquished his place on the podium after 35 years. Some choirs are sponsored by firms like Holman Climax or Imerys Engineering, the latter carrying on the sponsorship over many years by the clay giant ECCI.

Some say that male voice choirs come from places where there is a common workplace, as in the coal mines of south Wales. I have my doubts here as far as Cornwall is concerned. Since there are male choirs all over the Duchy this is clearly not the case except, of course, for the sponsored ones.

Choirs come and choirs go but, like one of the basic laws of physics, they never disappear. After St Ives Male Voice Choir disbanded, a small group of men emerged, calling themselves the Godrevy Singers, specialising in ‘old world’ hymn tunes. In the case of Treviscoe Male Voice Choir, famous as still being the only choir, so I understand, to have achieved the top prize at Llangollen, the men were clearly devoted to their founder leader Russell Kessell. Once he retired, several, including me, tried for a while to lead them, but you could see that they were constantly looking back to the days of Russell Kessell. After its demise, men transferred to choirs nearby, to Mevagissey and St Austell choirs.

The main object of the Cornish choir is to enjoy singing both in private and in public. Once again the Cornish chapels come to the rescue. The main part of all male voice singing is done in chapels, from the great caverns like Redruth and St Just to the tiny buildings that are hiding up back lanes just about everywhere. If the distance to a concert is long, the choir will usually hire a coach. Getting these huge beasts through the narrow lanes can be at times quite a challenge for the driver. Where the venue is closer, men usually take their cars and clog up the lanes all round the chapel. In some of the smaller ones, the choirs often outnumber the audiences.

One thing can always be said about chapels. They know how to feed a choir. After a concert, to come into the schoolroom and see a huge table groaning with sandwiches, pasties, sausage rolls, cream splits and saffron buns, to say nothing of the gallons of hot strong tea, is a welcome sight. Choirs in general attack the food like human vacuum cleaners, leaving little behind. Churches are often concert venues and in general are much better acoustically than the chapels. Filling the rafters with sound can be quite thrilling. At one time applause was encouraged in chapels but frowned on in churches. It was always slightly embarrassing to sing one’s heart out and make a really good job of a piece and at the end be greeted with silence. I shall never forget singing in a concert once in a quiet country church. We had really gone to town on the piece. When we were finished one lone voice from a pew near the back called out: “Lovely.”
Thank goodness those ‘clapless’ days are a thing of the past.

One important ingredient of the male voice world is the competitive festival. There are some choirs who do not take part in these, but most do. It is generally reckoned to be essential in keeping up, possibly raising, the quality of the choir’s singing standard. At one time it was usual to have to learn several given pieces; nowadays a choir usually chooses its own. From the conductor’s point of view these festivals are uplifting. The more you look into a piece, the more you see what it is all about, and the work which must be done to get into its meaning. From the singer’s point of view, not only is it uplifting but it demands very hard work. This is where the dedication of the men becomes only too apparent. For the weeks before the contest, the conductor demands not only one rehearsal a week, but two, three or even more. If the contest is taking place outside Cornwall - Bournemouth, Blackpool or, peaches of peaches, Llangollen - then three rehearsals a week is a minimum. A rehearsal every night of the week is not unknown.

Make no mistake, adjudicators are clever men and women. I have often said to a choir, prior to a contest, that the adjudicator has probably forgotten more about music than we, altogether, will ever know! It is not just getting the notes right but, for the choir, to lift those notes off the paper and reveal what the piece is all about. That is the reason for the hard work.

Winning the cup brings smiles and happiness and praise of the adjudicator; losing, even by only one mark, means that the journey home in the coach is silent, save for the odd comment about the adjudicator. However, audiences at concerts after these contests, won or lost, notice a great improvement in the singing.

Making up programmes for concerts for a male voice choir is easy since, once you have got a decent repertoire of pieces, you can repeat them concert after concert, bringing in new ones from time to time. There are, of course, a few essential pieces that must not be missed out. Much as you might be fed up with singing God’s Choir, it has to be included frequently!

When several choirs get together - always an enjoyable exercise - there is a wonderful feeling of camaraderie, not to say a competitive feel between choirs. Here the programme must suit all choirs and is usually not too demanding.

The ultimate experience is to become one of a group of massed choirs singing in the Royal Albert Hall in London, under professional conductors like Roy Wales and David Willcox. The sheer thrill, not to say a little nervousness, of emerging from the catacomb of passages behind the scenes on to the stepped stage in front of the organ has to be experienced to be believed. Once the concert is under way there seems to be electricity in the air; the mighty organ pushing from behind and the excitement of the audience in front.

Singing with other male voice choirs can often be combined with travel. Two choirs, separated by many miles, come together to sing and enjoy their mutual company. For example, the Cornish choir travels up to (say) Oxford and is put up by the host choir for a weekend of combined concerts. Sometime later, the Oxford choir comes down to Cornwall for a ‘return match’. This brings the best out of both choirs, helps to lift the standards of both, and makes some long lasting friends for many of the singers.

In recent years Cornwall has hosted two International Male Voice Festivals.
With concerts all over the Duchy, with choirs coming from all over the world as well as from Cornwall, it has combined the joy of singing together and has included some competition. Whether the choirs took part in the competitive part or not, they were all winners in what they gained from it. Time and again I hear from choir members how much they enjoyed the experience and, more important, how much they have learned by listening to the other choirs.

I must now pay special tribute to the accompanist, and probably upset all by saying that the accompanist is the most important member of any choir. Hour after hour, week after week, they must be ready for everything the conductor demands – and when he or she demands it. At concerts they must be with the choir, with the conductor, ready to rescue them if things go wrong. Not an easy job!

During a concert a choir needs a break. This is where the soloists come in: whether singers alone or in groups, sometimes from the choir; or orators, many specialising in the art of the Cornish dialect, many very amusing.

I have not mentioned names, since there are so many. We in Cornwall are very lucky that we have so many talented conductors, accompanists and soloists. Anyone the slightest bit interested in Cornish male voice choirs will know many of these people anyway, and will be impressed at what they do.

So to the future. Will we see male voice choirs in 60 or even 100 years time here in Cornwall? I fancy we will. While there is a will for men to want to come together to make music for themselves, and not just take what our television screen offers, there is hope. Things will change inevitably; the music the choirs sing will change and develop, composers will continue to write new music for them. Choirs will come and go, as they always have. The cry that young people are not coming into choirs will be answered when these youngsters get older. Then it will be their turn to criticise the young of their day. Male voice choirs are definitely here to stay. I would hate to think that there won’t be men gently singing those old favourites in the coach, as they make their homeward way in 2106!
 

For more information, please go to the Cornish Federation of Male Choirs website at www.fed-cornishchoirs.org.uk
 
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