The Gwalia Singers

A ‘quiz night’ was held at the Commercial, Upper Killay, on Thursday 1^st May. The evening was been organised by Gareth John, who runs the pub and also sings baritone in the choir.

The choir held its annual dinner on 19^th April, a little later than usual due to the choir’s visit to Disneyland and the early Easter this year. The evening was organised by Terry Osbourne and held at the Gower Golf Club. Over 90 choristers and guests attended and the music for after dinner dancing was provided by Clive Reynolds. Our Chairman, Paul Smith, formally thanked outgoing Chairman Clive Walters for holding the post for the past four years. Paul then presented Clive with a watch in appreciation of his hard work.

A highlight of the dinner is the presentation of ‘The Skull’. As with every organisation small mishaps, mistakes, and monumental ‘cock-ups’ occur during the year and this is given to the one chorister who we believe has made the biggest of them all. There were two nominations and the winner was John Davies for missing the last bus from our hotel in Disneyland on the Monday morning. We had been given free tickets to the Park, and John’s absence was only realised when we had 2 tickets left after everyone had got off the bus in the Park. Paul Smith was also with him, but John had the blame, as he had a dodgy stomach and had to return to his room before catching the bus. Apparently, this had nothing to do with the amount of beer consumed the night before!! Of course, getting into Disneyland without a ticket is another matter…

Yes, for those who missed the Six Nation Championship this year, the Welsh rugby team won the Grand Slam on 16th March. Further information is available at the South Wales Evening Post website. Click here to read an article. Don't forget to look at the slideshow, set to music by the Gwalia Singers!

The choir arrived in Paris as planned on Friday 29th February. After 2 rehearsals and a good night's sleep, we were ready to perform on stage at Disneyland, Paris. Unfortunately the weather was not good enough for us to perform on the outdoor stage as planned so an alternative indoor venue was prepared. After 4 concerts on Saturday 1st March and another 4 on Sunday 2nd March, the choir enjoyed a marvellous buffet at a nearby hotel, followed by singing in the bar (with an Italian waiter leading and conducting the Italian anthem with much enthusiasm). We returned home on Monday, but not before being treated to guest passes to the resort to enjoy the magic of Disney.

A fuller report of the visit, along with a video clip taken during a performance, is available here.

In preparation for our trip to Disneyworld, new polo shirts were presented to the choir by Gwalia Housing.

Rehearsals are in full swing for our trip to Disneyland for the St David’s Day Festival, and the choir are learning (or relearning) many of the old favourite Welsh songs for the occasion. We are delighted to announce that both Jeff Mogford and Wally Carey have passed their auditions to become full members and this means that we now have 45 singers in the choir. There are also another 4 probationary members coming to rehearsals at the moment.

With Christmas fast becoming a fading memory, the choir kicked off 2008 with a concert in Pontardawe for local senior citizens. We are currently in preparation for our visit to Disneyland, Paris, for their St. David's Welsh Festival, taking place from 29th February to 2nd March. For further information, see www.disneylandparis.com/uk/welsh_festival/

The leader of the Vivace Singers is running in the London Marathon alongside her sister in 2008. They are hoping to raise money for Cancer Research UK. If you are interested in sponsoring her, please visit her sponsor page: http://www.runningsponsorme.org/kirstenoffer

Our annual concert took place on 20^th October and, once again, it was hugely successful. The Waterfront Community Church provided an excellent venue and despite the Rugby World Cup Final being played at the same time, we had a full house.

Appearing with us were The Ariosa Singers. They are a young choir who have been together for just over two years and are made up of singers aged between 9 and 27, many of whom hope to follow careers in music. Their musical director is Mrs Penny Ryan and on this occasion they were accompanied by her husband, Les Ryan.

Both choirs sang a very varied programme and included in our programme were standards such as Morte Christe and Calon Lan. We also sang a new arrangement of You Raise Me Up by Alan Simmons, which featured Len Fuge and Lawrence Sutton singing the solo part. The first half ended with an arrangement by our musical team of the great Tom Jones classic Delilah, which was very well received.

The Ariosa Singers included two specially commissioned works, Ave Maria by Lisa Mears and Irish Blessing by Richard John. Other highlights of their programme were an arrangement by Roger Emerson of Fields of Gold by Sting, and a very powerful setting of the words Lux Aerterna to Elgar’s Nimrod, which showed the expertise of the young singers, as it was arranged for double choir.

We finished our programme with the fine arrangement of a medley of songs by Frank Sinatra, which includes Fly Me To The Moon, Strangers In The Night, My Way and ends with New York, New York. The two choirs then joined on stage to sing Anthem from Chess, arranged by Les Ryan, which led to rapturous applause, bringing many of the audience to their feet.

We were once again accompanied by the excellent Rhian Liles and our musical director Nick Rogers was very pleased with the performance of the choir and the evening as a whole. He was also especially pleased to see 40 singers on stage, the biggest ever choir at an annual concert.

The Gwalia Singers have been chosen to represent Wales during a St David's Day celebration in Disneyland, Paris in 2008.

It will be Paris in the springtime for a Swansea choir after it was chosen to head the St David's Day celebrations at Euro Disney.

The Gwalia Singers beat off the challenge of scores of Welsh male voice choirs for the honour.
"I can hardly believe we have been chosen," said secretary Alan Clewett.
"It's great to have a choir from the West."
The 46-strong choir - founded in 1966 - took its chance with a host of others from across Wales.
"Euro Disney had a St David's Day celebration last year, but what was missing was a male voice choir," said Mr Clewett.
"They contacted the National Association of Choirs, who contacted all-Welsh male voice choirs."
The city choir made its pitch and was delighted to come out on top.
"Disneyland Paris is about entertainment and they wanted a choir which could not only sing traditional Welsh songs but could also entertain," said Mr Clewett.
"We also do comical numbers and have a wide variety. They asked for our last CD, and also said we had a good website."
The choir are awaiting full details of the trip, but have been asked to do five 30-minute slots on March 1 and 2.
The choir are now on the lookout for sponsorship for items like special sweatshirts. Members are also putting the finishing touches to their programme for the annual Gwalia Singers concert at the Waterfront Community Church in Swansea's SA1 on Saturday, October 20, at 7.15pm.

The concert at Pontarddulais (see report below) was a milestone in the history of the Gwalia Singers. In November 2006 we realised that we had to do some serious recruiting, as our numbers had decreased to just 34 singers. Following a tremendous effort by the members and our publicity officer, Tom Bartley, we have now increased to 44 singers, with another 2 who have yet to become full members. This showed on Tuesday night as we had 39 singers on stage, and this is believed to be the largest choir that the Gwalia Singers have ever put out in its 40 year history.

The choir's previous conductor, Simon Oram, picked up the baton once more to lead the choir at a wedding reception in Usk. The bride was, in fact, Simon's mother. The wedding guests enjoyed the concert and afterwards the choir continued singing in the less formal environment of the hotel bar.

The choir went west to Pontarddulais to sing for a full house at the Mechanics Institute on St. Teilo Street. It was a fund raising evening for the Arthritis Research Campaign and the evening was opened by Jane Jones, one of the news presenters from BBC Wales. We had an excellent evening and were well received by the audience. On the way home one of our cars had a slight mishap. In rather inclement weather, Pontarddulais’ one way system, and seemingly lack of sign posts, caused problems which somehow found the driver going through Garnswllt and then on to Ammanford. It was some twenty five minutes later that the car was travelling on the M4 passing Pontarddulais!

We made our annual pilgrimage to the Giltar Hotel in Tenby to entertain the guests staying on holiday in the area. A number of the old favourites were sung and the choir performed ‘You Raise Me Up’ for the first time. It was great to see Charles Clewett, our secretary’s brother, join us for the evening.

The choir performed at a social evening held at the church hall in Bishopston. Reverend Chris Lee had returned from America and brought a number of his parishioners with him to Wales for a short stay. The choir was well received by the visitors and a very enjoyable evening was had by all.

A performance was given at the impressive Celtic Manor Resort for a conference held by Medtronic, a company that provides medical technology for people with chronic disease. The audience all enjoyed a fairly brief concert and the choir found time to relax and enjoy a buffet plus a few drinks afterwards.

A Swansea choir is on a recruitment drive to build on its latest success. The Gwalia Singers was one of 60 choirs to feature in the Cornwall International Male Voice Choir Festival. It took its place alongside others from Finland, France and Sweden.

The Swansea choir received standing ovations for its two concerts.

Officials are now on the lookout for new recruits, with rehearsals at Swansea Yacht & Sub-Aqua Club every Tuesday at 7.15pm.

The choir headed off to Cornwall on Friday to participate in the Cornwall International Male Voice Choral Festival. We spent a leisurely Saturday exploring St Ives and trying to avoid the seagulls. Not entirely successfully in our MD's case! We performed at the Liskeard Methodist Church in the evening. Sunday saw a visit to the Eden Project before one more concert in St. Austell. On the programme with us on both occasions was the impressive Czech Boys' Choir (Boni Pueri). An enjoyable weekend was had by all! A few pictures from the weekend can be seen at http://www.gwalia-swansea.co.uk/cornwall.html