the first twenty years 2005-2025
the first twenty years
This book celebrates Winchester Community Choir’s 20th birthday. To date, under the benign influence of folk legends Sarah Morgan and Carolyn Robson we have amassed a huge repertoire of mainly local folk songs, performed over 40 concerts and raised nearly £50K for local charities. Now, under Zack Stephens, we look forward to creating joyous entertainment for the community and ourselves for another 20 years.
credits
Editorial Team | Denis Gibson, Simon Selwood and Wenda Moroney
Thanks to the photographers and artists for the images they have generously allowed us to use | Javaid Akhtar, Angus Beaton, Christel Buis, Steve Gapper, Dan Gibson, Su Jordan, Shirley Reed, Kate Selwood
Thanks to the writers who have contributed stories | Linda Bowman, Gerry Bracey, Jean Forster, Iris Gould, Su Jordan, Gill Lailey, Christopher Napier, Paul Northcott, Simon Selwood, Liz Tennent
Printed by | The Sarsen Press, Winchester
intro WinchesterCommunityChoir2025
Front cover | Our Music Directors over the last two decades: (clockwise) Freya Tabbush, Sarah Morgan, Zack Stephens, Carolyn Robson. Back cover | The choir at the Theatre Royal in February 2024 in Rivers & Roads, a show to commemorate Sarah Morgan and Paul Sartin.
Legend has it that a lady called Zuleika came from the North Country and determined that Winchester should have its own open access community choir. She plotted with her friend Jean Forster, and together they set about persuading Sarah Morgan to lead a new choir.
Busy Sarah was reluctant at first but was persuaded to run two one-day singing workshops at Henry Beaufort School on Saturdays in the spring and early summer of 2005 to discover whether there was enough interest in the city to create a viable choir. The workshops were a roaring success and so the Winchester Community Choir came into being in September 2005, with 100 members and a waiting list for places.
Paul Northcott (Basses)
Zuleika would be amused that she was the stuff of legends. She now lives in London and I see occasional photos of her from holidays abroad.
I first met Sarah Morgan in Whitby at the Folk Festival and she told me of her monthly Song and Supper at the White Lion, Wherwell. Jim and I attended and then joined her choir at Broughton. That ended when the event it was preparing for was over. I was out to lunch with her, said how much I missed her Broughton Choir and she said. 'Why not start one?' So, we put some adverts in the Chronicle to see what interest there was and used Sam Blakey who had experience in newspaper speak. People who turned up were asked what their school experience of singing was. 'Open your mouth but don't sing' seemed to be a popular opinion BUT that had not killed a desire to sing.
Jean Forster (Tunes)
Twenty years ago I spotted a notice in a dry cleaner’s shop window in the Andover Road. It asked anyone who was interested in joining a new choir to turn up at St Lawrence’s Church.
It was a chilly evening when I tentatively entered the Church, which was bright, warm and cosy. Sarah Morgan was very welcoming and soon had us singing a round, We Will Sing Together. After years of solo singing at the kitchen sink, and singing nursery rhymes to children, it felt wonderful to join in song with others and I felt so joyful. When I arrived home, my husband asked me if I’d enjoyed it, and I said, ‘It was lovely!’ That was the start of my long love affair with the Winchester Community Choir.
Left|Anearlychoirposter, maybetheoneIrissawinher drycleaner’swindow.The averagecostofachoirsession nowis£4.40,(£3.60for concessions).How’sthatfor beatinginflation!
Iris Gould (Tunes)
At a social lunch with Jean Forster, early in 2005, she told us how much she missed singing in a choir in the north of England where she had previously lived. Not willing to accept her new ‘choirless’ life in Winchester, she managed to persuade her new friend, Sarah Morgan, to find out if there was much interest in community singing in the Winchester area.
Sarah was already leading a busy life, but eventually agreed to run two or three taster sessions in choral singing at the weekends at the Henry Beaufort School. About two dozen of us attended, and by the end of the session, were amazed that the rounds and simple songs we’d learnt sounded so good.
The interest was definitely there, but Sarah was unable to commit to weekly rehearsals, so she asked young Freya Tabbush to share the task with her. They took it in turns to lead the choir in St Lawrence’s Church in the Square, on Tuesday evenings. The interest was growing, and each of our leaders brought something different to the new choir. Freya taught us some African songs and even one in Japanese.
From time to time, Freya brought her mother, Carolyn Robson, along with her. Carolyn was a close friend of Sarah’s, and was supportive of both leaders. When neither Sarah nor Freya were available, Carolyn stepped in to take the choir herself, something she clearly enjoyed doing.
Liz Tennent (Tunes)
Below | Some of the choir founders: Co-Leader Sarah Morgan in front, and behind her (left to right) Treasurer
Jean Forster, Chair of the choir Wenda Moroney and Co-Leader Freya Tabbush.
The Choir Committee met in our dining room. The committee was a fabulous collection of skills. You couldn't have chosen them any better. Community Choirs were a thing whose time had come and there we were.
Sarah Morgan job-shared as Music Director with Freya Tabbush and I don't remember it being turn and turn about but by arrangement between them. From our point of view it worked well. Freya's mum, Carolyn Robson, filled in when neither could be there and she liked our singing. Little did we know of the tragedy of the death of Sarah that gave that knowledge extra meaning when the unthinkable happened.
Looking back there was much laughter, enjoyment, nerves towards performances, hard work from many talented people, committee meetings, money raised for charities chosen by members, eating and drinking (the catering for Sarah's funeral was thought to be professional it was so good), one death in a car accident, one marriage between two members (John and Jane), carol singing in care homes and at the Christmas Market in the cold. One highlight was the gathering of community choirs from a large area held
Thank you Choir for what you give and develop in so many of us. Here’s to
Jean Forster (Tunes)
The earliest photographs we can find of the choir in action., from Christmas 2006. Freya Tabbush and Sarah Morgan out front. The same lights twinkled on the columns at Christmas 2023, but not last year.
A close shot of intense concentration.
I have always been a folkie, with a great love of traditional songs, so I was excited to learn, not long after the Choir started, that we were to combine with two other local choirs – Alton Community Choir, led by Carolyn Robson, and the Andover Museum Loft Singers, led by Paul Sartin, to mark the visit of the song collector George Gardiner to Hampshire in the early years of the 20th century. He visited cottages, farms and workhouses and collected a vast number of songs. Each of the choirs would learn a selection of these and we would combine in three different locations for concerts. This involved rehearsals in village and school halls in the countryside that were most enjoyable. I remember
Wenda Moroney (Tops/Tenors) recals that, in the early days, Sarah Morgan hated the fact that everyone knew her and that she didn’t know the names of everyone in the choir. ‘At the beginning of a rehearsal we had to sing our names individually to help her to remember them.’
In the first year or so, Freya Tabbush was based in South London and commuted to Winchester to conduct the choir every other week. She loved every minute! But, sadly, left us in the summer of 2008.
As well as co-leading Winchester Community Choir, Freya was involved in many other music projects. She was part of a music organisation called Gymboree Play & Music, concerned with teaching music and art to underfives and their parents. She held the Gymboree franchise for Twickenham. And she sang in a harmony trio with her sisters, the Tabbush Sisters, and played and called for various ceilidh and barndance bands all over South East England. Freya was brought up in a very musical family and folk music has always been a big part of her life.
Freya does the odd locum as a choir leader every now and then. She was with us in early 2023 doing just that. She is busy with her family, still plays fiddle and calls at ceilidhs, and now runs a retail business in Midhurst, the wonderful Wizzbits Toys.
Right | Freya Tabbush made a return visit in 2009, to the choir’s Christmas concert. Here she is in the audience with husband, Chris Parles.
Following a workshop run by Sarah Morgan, the choir is born.
We record the Radio Solent Christmas concert at Romsey Abbey, on 9 December. It is broadcast on Christmas Day.
June Boyce-Tillman starts Space for Peace. We take part in this wonderful Cathedral event for many years.
Hilary James and Simon Mayor are guest performers at our Christmas concert.
After the death of Sarah Morgan, Carolyn Robson becomes our Music Director.
We decide to perform in choir colours - black with accessories in sea colours.
Freya Tabbush, our co-director from the start moves on.
The choir presents The Way through the Woods with student ensemble Brass 22.
Sarah introduces the idea of section leaders. They are:
1st Sop
2nd Sop Alto Bass
Wenda Moroney
Catherine Hahn
Maggie Rees
Cath Hart
Claire Hollick
Emma Holland
Syd Meats,
Paul Montgomery
The choir celebrates its 10th anniversary with a wonderful cake.
Food and singing often go together, not least on our 2015 trip to Britany.
The choir visits Giessen in Germany for a long weekend of singing and sightseeing. We visit Elizabethkirche in Marburg while we are there.
We sing Wendy Sergeant’s arrangement of Moon River for the first time. A lovely addition to our repertoire.
Covid! The country is locked down. The choir cannot meet in person and goes online. There is a long ‘road map’ out of lockdown until we can sing together in our new rehearsal venue - the United Church Winchester.
The baton changes hands. Carolyn hands over to Zack.
100 years since some women were given the vote. Our summer concert marks the centenary.
Avante Dilettanti visit us, with Music Director Claudia Jirka and the Mayor of Giessen Dietlind Grabe-Bolz.
Our first public performance after lockdown.
We sing with owls at The Hawk Conservancy Trust, in their annual Christmas Carols and Owls by Moonlight. Magical!
Since the beginning, the choir has been active in the community, singing in care homes, the hospital and night shelter, and fundraising for good causes. Over the years we’ve raised nearly £50,000 for charities, most of them local to Hampshire.
Our usual fundraising at concerts was disrupted in 2021 because of Covid. There were no concerts! Nonetheless, we managed to raise real funds in the virtual world. Using the RallyUp app we ran the on-line Grand Sock and Gin Raffle for the Southampton Children's Hospital and sold books via JustGiving for the charity Emmaus Winchester.
Iris Gould donated 50 copies of Placing my Past, a memoir with recollections of Eastern European Jewish forebears, the war years and afterwards in East London, many misadventures, and the life story of her formidable ‘ma-in-law’. The book is beautifully illustrated by Iris’s grand-daughter. Thank you, Iris.
First prize in the Winchester Community Choir Grand Sock and Gin Raffle was a pair of socks. Not any socks but handknitted hosiery of the finest quality from the illustrious House of Robson. Many thanks to Carolyn for many hours of craft and industry and for donating these works of art to the raffle.
Second prize was a superb bottle of Gill Lailey’s Lockdown Sloe Gin. Made with the finest botanicals, and lovingly nurtured through its maturation. Gill’s quality control, achieved through frequent tasting of each batch, was second to none. Thank you, Gill.
Top | Caroling at Flowerdown Care Home in 2024 with Cath Hart (right) leading us. Below Big cheques in 2009 for Key Changes & Clic Sargent (now renamed Young Lives vs Cancer).
in our community
Sometimes we don’t give money but donate our services by singing at a fundraising event. That can take us to some surprising places...
The Hawk Conservancy Trust is a charity with a mission to conserve birds of prey and their habitats. Its Christmas Carols and Owls by Moonlight is one of the Trust's most popular and important fundraising events of the year. On 19 December 2023, the choir sang carols alongside the Trust's free-flying owls in front of an audience of 300 people. It was bone-chilling cold, magical, and a little scary, all at the same time. David d’Arcy Hughes wrote in our annual report, ‘The choir being dive-bombed by eagle-owls was not something I ever expected to see.’
Here are some of the organisations that have received grants from the choir. We are able to make these grants because of the incredible generosity or our concert audiences who give their hard-earned cash in retiring collections at the end of concerts. And we top that up with a share of concert ticket sales.
Our efforts will continue into the future. In 2025, our anniversary year, we will be making donations to
Citizens Advice Winchester District - a local, independent charity and part of a network of local Citizens Advice services across the country. It aims to improve the lives of local people through advice, support and campaigning. ReadEasy Winchester - the local branch of a national charity that offers help to adults with reading difficulties or who cannot read at all. Learning to read as an adult can be life-changing.
Sarah Morgan co-founded our choir with Freya Tabbush in 2005. Sarah was a vital formative influence in the first decade. She died in 2013. The Foundation created in her name supports community choirs and the publication of choral arrangements of traditional folk song, Sarah’s lifelong passions. The Foundation organised three memorial concerts over the years and our choir has taken part in every one.
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Top Left | ‘Queen of the May’ - an early photograph of Sarah Morgan Top Right | And in 2012 after the May morning gathering at Beechurst Bottom | Carolyn Robson, Moira Craig, Mary Eagle and the choir at Sarah’s PhD viva in 2013.
Top | Angus Beaton’s often-published photograph of Sarah with our choir. It appeared at the top of her obituary in The Guardian (see opposite).
Below
Sarah conducting the choir at its summer party in June 2013. The last photo of Sarah with the choir.
obituary
Sarah Morgan, who has died from cancer aged 65, was a linchpin of the English traditional folk scene. What had begun as a musical interest led her through a capella harmony singing with Mary Eagle, Bread & Roses and Hen Party, to the trio Craig, Morgan, Robson.
She performed regularly, led harmony workshops at folk festivals including Chippenham and Whitby, and founded community choirs in Winchester and Andover with English folk music at the heart of their repertoires – including many of her own arrangements. Recently, she ran conferences on community choirs at Winchester University and at the folk arts centre Cecil Sharp House in London. Her hobby became her profession.
Born in Epsom, Surrey, into an RAF family, Sarah inherited her father Philip Groom's love of music and wicked sense of humour, and her mother Lynette's love of nature. She performed in musicals at her church youth group as a teenager, and a boyfriend encouraged her in solo singing.
After A-levels, Sarah spent time teaching in working-class schools in Liverpool, and this started a journey on which she would find fulfilment through enabling development in others.
In Brighton in the 1960s, while training as a teacher, she married Don Morgan, helping bring up his young children and becoming immersed in the vibrant folk scene. Over the next 25 years, she went from horse-riding instruction to youth training to management training (latterly for Ofcom).
Sarah completed an English degree as a mature student at Reading University. Wanting to continue her education beyond this, in the last weeks of her life she finished her doctoral submission (her PhD was awarded posthumously by Winchester University). Her thesis, Community Choirs - A Musical Transformation: A Review of My Work in Management, Music, Choir Leadership and Folk Song, will be published as an ebook; a Sarah Morgan Foundation is being created to continue her work.
In 1992, she married Steve Jordan, gaining another stepchild – me. In 1995, they moved from Winchester to the small Hampshire village of St Mary Bourne, where Sarah lived and maintained her beautiful cottage and garden until her death.
Sarah was an affectionate, generous, highly intelligent woman with a successful career and a busy, full life; an inspirational role model.
Sarah and Steve divorced four years ago. She is survived by another stepdaughter, Angela, me and my daughter Clio - her beloved new grandchild.
Below SarahwithAngusBeatonshortlybeforeherdeath.Anguswrites, ‘EvenatthatlatestageSarahdelightedinrebelliouslyfollowinginthe styleofJennyJoseph’spoem Warning -
When I am an old woman I shall wear purple With a red hat which doesn’t go, and doesn’t suit me.’
This obituary by Su Jordan appeared in The Guardian in December 2013. Su Jordan is Sarah’s step-daughter, better known to choir members as Susanna Starling. She performed the hauntingly beautiful folk song Polly Vaughan at the Rivers & Roads concert in February 2024.
united church st lawrence’s church
Since it was formed, the choir has held concerts at the United Church. In 2022, weekly rehearsals moved there. The church was built between 1852 and 1853 to the Gothic Revival design of architects Poulton and Woodman for a congregation which had its origins nearly 200 years earlier. The building is ‘incongruously set within the northern part of the former county jail’.
Pevsner Architectural Guides: Buildings of England (Hampshire: Winchester and the North)
We rehearsed at St Lawrence’s until the pandemic and lockdown in 2021.
St Lawrence is the only church of Norman foundation within the old city walls that survives as a parish church. No record of its original building survives, but it is likely that it was the chapel of William the Conqueror’s Royal Palace which was built in 1069-70. The church was destroyed by fire in 1141 and rebuilt in about 1150. The Black Death of 1348/9 decimated the population of the city and the church fell into ruins. It was eventually rebuilt and is now a haven of peace in The Square.
Elaine Howells (Tops/Tenors)
We sang at the Theatre Royal in February 2024. The venue began life in 1850 as The Market Hotel. It was used as a convenient stop-over point for farmers on their way to buy and sell in the Corn Exchange next door (now The Arc). In 1912 the building was bought by the Simpkins brothers who converted it to a theatre.
Several refurbs later, the Theatre Royal is a beautiful heritage auditorium with modern stage and Front of House facilities.
Top Left | The narrow facade of UCW on Jewry Street Top Right | A visually uncomfortable fisheye view of The Sanctuary. An arcade of ‘lanky’ pointed arches support the impressive hammerbeam roof.
Top| Shirley Reed’s line drawing of St Lawrence Below| One of the St Lawrence altar cloths.
winchester cathedral the guildhall
The choir has sung at the Cathedral in many events organised by Rev Prof June Boyce-Tillman. There may have been a choir in Winchester since the Old Minster was built around 648. The new Cathedral, started in 1079, had songbooks which still survive from the 11th century - the Winchester Tropers. These books are some of the oldest music manuscripts in Europe. The two volumes of the Tropers are now in Corpus Christi College, Cambridge and the Bodleian in Oxford.
At the Guildhall we have sung carols at a military dinner and performed in memorial concerts for Sarah Morgan. The Victorian building stands on land that can be traced back to Alfred the Great. He gave it to his wife as a wedding gift in 871 AD.
The choir has also sung in the 10th century Romsey Abbey, dedicated to Saint Æthelflæda who used to bathe and pray in the nearby River Test more than a thousand years ago. Wikipedia puts it more colourfully, ‘St Æthelflæda had a secret habit of naked, al fresco bathing and prayer.’
For one-night only (when our regular rehearsal room was unavailable) we practiced at St Swithun-upon-Kingsgate. The tiny church was first mentioned in the Winton Domesday of 1148 - ‘in the gate of King's Gate the sacristan receives 15d’.
Social events have been part of choir life since the beginning. In the early days. a catering committee organised food and drink. A member of the original team explains...
All the members of the catering committee were friends, who lived in Badger Farm and were linked to Stanmore Primary School. We all used to sing in the Kings' School Parents Choir, which sang once a year at their Christmas Concert in the Cathedral. In 2005 I noticed an advert in the free Extra paper about a new community choir being formed in Winchester. We all joined and not long after became the catering committee, organising, with other choir volunteers, refreshments for concerts, workshops etc. Sadly, we lost Mary Gray and Sheila Hague, Cherry Giles moved to Plymouth in 2010 (returning in 2022), Helen White became an official Game Maker at the 2012 Olympics and didn't return to the choir, which left me! Thankfully Sue Elliott stepped up and we two continued until Covid.
Gerry Bracey (Tops)
Hazel Chenhall organises social events nowadays, helped by volunteers from each part of the choir in turn. Start-of-term and end-of-term socials are a regular on the choir calendar. And a buffet supper at The Stable in The Square is warming and sociable, after our performance at the Christmas Market.
We sing about cider, sit beneath neon cider signs, and drink it in France. Don’t get the wrong impression. The choir is sober. Singing is a serious business. But it is thirsty work!
Left | The catering committee. From the left, (seated) Gerry Bracey, Helen White and Mary Gray, (standing) Cherry Giles and Sheila Hague, Middle | Tim Kent, social events organiser in the early days, talks to Paul Northcott Right | Around the table at The Stable.
socializing
We celebrated our 10th anniversary with a party at Littleton Memorial Hall. A bring-and-eat, apart from that wonderful cake, baked and iced by Anne Dee. There were home-grown entertainments and, of course, the choir sang.
Top Left to Right | Carolyn Robson, Jean Forster and that cake! | Syd Meats entertains with guitar | Tracy Appleyard clog dancing | John Wilson with his concertina.
Bottom Left | The choir in civvies. Well, it is a party and not a performance.
Carolyn Robson was the choir’s Music Director for just over a decade, from the autumn 2013 to spring 2024.
At the beginning of her career Carolyn was a rarity – a classically-trained musician performing on the folk club circuit in the UK. She combines a consummate musicality with a deep love and knowledge of traditional song from the British Isles and beyond.
Only 150 people have been awarded the EFDSS Gold Badge. Carolyn joins distinguished recipients that include Ralph Vaughan Williams, folk song collector Cecil Sharp and performers Ewan MacColl and Peggy Seeger.
From her native Northumberland she moved to London to study voice and piano at the Royal Academy of Music (LRAM). And then trained to be a teacher at Gipsy Hill College (now the performing arts department of Kingston University). Her music teaching career took her to Dorset, the Scottish Borders and Wales during the 1970s and 80s. In Dorset she began freelance work with the BBC, first as presenter for Radio 4’s Music Workshop – a music broadcast for schools. Later, in the 1980s, and living back in the North East of England, she worked for Radio Newcastle, writing and presenting weekly folk music programmes.
In 1990 Carolyn was appointed Education Officer for the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS). Twenty-five years later, Carolyn was presented with a rare award from the English Folk Dance and Song Society. She was awarded its Gold Badge for outstanding services to folk music.
Top Left | Carolyn in 1970, on acceptance for the LRAM. Top Right | With one of the many instruments she plays.
Middle Right | A popular workshop leader, here she is in Bath at a Folk South West Easter School.
Bottom | The Gold Badge of the English Folk Dance and Song Society.
years with carolyn
Carolyn is a great musical collaborator, perhaps most successfully with Moira Craig and Sarah Morgan in Craig Morgan Robson. Their acapella trio formed in 2003 and performed and recorded until Sarah Morgan’s untimely death in 2013. Craig Morgan Robson toured throughout the UK, made several tours of the USA and Canada, and recorded three highly acclaimed albums.
Introducing Winchester Community Choir at a concert in February 2024, Carolyn explained how she came to be our Music Director...
I took Sarah to a final rehearsal with Winchester Community Choir a week before she died. Her parting words to me were, ‘You’ll look out for my Winchester Community Choir, won’t you?’ It wasn’t a question so much as a command. And I’ve been with them ever since, for the last 10 years. It’s been a great pleasure.
Carolyn suffered a life-threatening illness in February 2024 and has made a remarkable recovery. However, the experience caused her to halve her impossibly busy schedule of rehearsing four choirs in all corners of Hampshire. She, reluctantly, said farewell to us, the choir farthest from her home in Farnham.
Top Left | Craig Morgan Robson performed with the choir at our Way through the Woods concert in June 2010.
Top Right | Carolyn at her first concert as our MD, in December 2013.
Bottom | Carolyn at our summer concert in July 2017.
It was a surreal experience to be singing Christmas songs on one of the hottest days of the summer, but in July 2016 we found ourselves singing Cradle Song and Beautiful Star of Bethlehem on the second recording day for our CD project. Work had started earlier that year, when plans were made to capture the choir in high quality audio, creating a record of what the choir had achieved over the previous decade, a physical product that could be sold at concerts and on our website.
Carolyn chose some favourites from the choir’s repertoire – mostly traditional songs from Hampshire - and we made a start on the recording in January 2016 in St Lawrence’s Church in The Square, which was at that time our regular practice venue. With the expert help of recording engineer Nick Sowden and after multiple takes we completed three songs that day, but struggled with the noise from nearby buskers whose amplified sound couldn’t be kept out by the 12th century walls of the church.
For our next recording day in the summer of 2016 we set up in St Barnabas Church in Weeke on the outskirts of Winchester. We made good progress in that quieter venue, despite the occasional noisy bus going past and the summer heat. It was hard work singing each song 10 to 20 times, with Carolyn encouraging us to get as close to perfection as possible. We had a break to focus on concerts and other choir activities before reconvening for our final recording session in July 2017.
Once the recordings were all complete, Nick spent a few months working his magic to edit the best takes together and polish our sound. In the meantime the choir committee collated photos taken by choir members and worked with a professional designer to produce a high quality booklet and cover. We were proud of the finished product, titled Come Walk With Me after a line in Sarah Morgan’s beautiful song View the Land. The CD was available for sale at our Christmas concert in December 2017, and is still available as an online stream via our website.
Simon Selwood (Basses)
recording the choir
The noise from nearby buskers that made recording impossible in St Lawrence’s came courtesy of the Jim· Hammond duo and especially their amplified double bass. The choir had a whip round, raised £80 and offered it to the duo. It wasn’t enough for them to pack up. But redoubtable choir member Sandi Roll was on her mobile finding out about the Winchester Buskers Code which advises musicians to ‘move on to another pitch after an hour.’ Eventually a friendly policeman had a quiet word and they left, complaining later to the Hampshire Chronicle. Belgarum didn’t quite get the story right, but we quite liked being called ‘Team Heaven’.
We are so grateful to all the volunteers who have helped us with audio and video recordings of the choir over the last two decades. Special thanks to Chris Brown who is often in the shadows but has recorded superb audio tracks of our live concert performances in recent years.
Left | Here we are, lined up behind the mic stands at St Barnabas Church for our second recording session. The Church has a lovely acoustic. But other choirs have found recording troublesome when it rains hard. The church has a tin roof and adds overwhelming percussion during a downpour. Fortunately the weather was kind for us.
WemadeanearlystartfortheferryonFriday12June2015.Here’sanaccountofthe trip,fromtwosingerswhomadethejourney.
We thought the all-day coach and ferry journey to France would be arduous, but this was not the case. It was an excellent opportunity to get to know people.
The next morning (Saturday), we rehearsed with Carolyn outside our hotel in the sunshine. Then, fabulous free time in La Gacilly, visiting craft shops and cafes and a colourful outdoor national photographic exhibition. Later our hosts treated us to lunch in the community centre, Salle du Docteur Mathurin Robert. And in the evening, the serious business of our concert in Église Saint-Nicolas, with its wonderful acoustics, and a warm, appreciative audience.
Sunday was a day of touring the countryside, and for those who like cider, an opportunity to visit a cider shop at Pont d’Arz. We had lunch there at Restaurant Chez Bernard where Carolyn knew the owner. We were prevailed upon to sing Wassail the Silver Apple to the other customers! Onward, then to the beautiful commune of Rochefort-enTerre with its medieval chateau, old shops and houses.
That final evening, our hosts treated us to a supper and a ceilidh at the Salle des Fêtes in La Gacilly. We realised that, interestingly, not all singers can dance!
Linda Bowman & Gill Lailey
Top Left | Judy Russell and Eveleen McGivern on the coach. Middle Left | Lunch in the Salle du Docteur Mathurin Robert.
Bottom Left | Carolyn Robson considers a purchase at the cider shop in Pont d’Arz. Top Right | The Photography Festival in La Gacilly. Bottom Right | Debra Grech, Maggie Rees and Gerry Bracey enjoy La Gacilly’s cafe culture.
giessen 2017
About 30 choir members, along with Carolyn Robson, gathered early on Friday 29 September to travel to Giessen, Winchester’s twin town in Germany. After a 12-hour journey, the coach arrived at our hotel in Giessen for dinner. Next morning, we were taken on an extensive tour of Giessen’s town centre, with an ascent of the old town church tower, from which we had wide views over the town and surroundings. We also saw the statue of the Schlammbeiser, the site of the old synagogue, and the modern Rathaus (town hall). After lunch in the Saturday market, we went to the Petruskirche for a workshop. We met the local choirs Orea Fori and Avanti Dilettanti to practise various pieces, including Brahms’ Erlaube mir, feins Mädchen, and Mein kleiner grüner Kaktus, a 1930s comic song.
We visited the Romanesque Basilica at the Schiffenberg, gave an impromptu performance in its wonderful acoustic, and then dinner with the other choirs at Restaurant Au Lac.
Off to Marburg on Sunday where we visited the outstanding Gothic church with its tomb of St Elizabeth of Hungary. We returned to the Petruskirche in Giessen for our celebration concert, where the three choirs sang both separately and together for a large audience. The evening finished with a buffet hosted by the German/English Society. Then back to the hotel for a good night’s sleep before the long coach ride back to Winchester.
Christopher Napier(Basses)
Stained glass in the Petruskirche in Giessen. Bottom Left | Choir members at the Schlammbeiser statue, a monument to the men who collected human waste before a sewer system was built in Giessen in 1904.
Basilica at the Schiffenberg Monastery near Giessen. Bottom Right | The Wolf and the Seven Young Goats celebrates the Brothers Grimm fairytale in Marburg.
Winchester Community Choir hosted a visit by a German choir, Avanti Dilettanti from Giessen on a long weekend at the end of May 2019.
On their first full day, we showed them the sights of the city: tours of the Cathedral and Winchester College, a visit to City Mill, a walk through the Water Meadows to St Cross and back to the Cathedral for evensong where they were greeted by Canon Roly Riem and the Bishop.
We had a Ceilidh in the evening. Panda-monium (Syd Meats and his mate, Damian) entertained us. Tracey Appleyard danced for us (properly) and the rest of us danced improperly, despite expert calling and wonderful music from Paul Tabbush and the band.
The following day (Saturday) we had a joint choir workshop in the afternoon. The Avantis brought Brahms (Erlaube mir, feins Mädchen) and we brought Sarah Morgan’s beautiful arrangement of the folk song The Water is Wide. And we performed in the evening at The United Church in our concert called, fittingly, Together.
Sunday involved a trip to Portsmouth’s historic dockyard, complete with actors in costume, and retail therapy at Gunwharf Quays for those who needed a shopping fix. We said farewell over an Italian meal and wine at Ask on Sunday evening.
Top | Avanti Dilettanti, pleased with their performance at our Saturday evening concert. Bottom Left | The Avantis’ Music Director, Claudia Jirka. Bottom Right | Prost! At Ask.
Top Left | Men at work(shop): John Wilson, David d’Arcy Hughes and Jon Benn.
Middle Left | Two mayors: Cllr Eleanor Bell, the Mayor of Winchester and Dietlind Grabe-Bolz, the Mayor of Giessen.
Bottom Left | Henry VIII with his six wives for the day. Cath Hart (far right) led the Portsmouth trip and that’s Gerda Patrick-Smith beside her. The other wives are Avantis we think.
Top Right | Our concert poster. The image is based on an art work called REFLEXION - the transformation of 3 Berlin Wall segments, by 3Steps collective (Kai H. & Uwe H. Krieger and Joachim Pitt).
Bottom Right | choirs together for a final group photo.
In March 2020 members of Skagit Valley Chorale attended a rehearsal in Mount Vernon, USA. Within days, 53 choir members became ill, three were hospitalized, and two died. Covid had struck a choir.
This super-spreading event in the USA, and a similar incident in France, persuaded public health authorities in this country that singing in a choir was particularly dangerous. The initial lockdown affected us all. Later restrictions on amateur choirs were more severe and lasted longer than restrictions on many other activities in sport and the arts.
On Zoom during lockdown are John
What
did we do during the pandemic? We Zoomed during lockdown when meetings of any description were banned. We rehearsed in River Park when meetings were allowed outdoors. It was fun and sometimes felt like a performance as dog-walkers and passers-by paused to listen, dogs off the lead and racing amongst our socially-distanced singers. When we could meet indoors again in September 2021, we moved to the United Church , a large and well-ventilated rehearsal room. We live-streamed rehearsals to singers unable to venture out.
Below Left | River Park, the site of our outdoor rehearsal venue.
Below Right | The fashionable Keplin Safety Shield used at rehearsal in the Covid years.
Above|
Wilson, Jane Wilson, Annette Gibson, Denis Gibson, Syd Meats, Jean Forster, Elaine Howells, Wenda Moroney, Carolyn Robson, Joan Dartnall, David d’Arcy Hughes, Hazel Chenhall, Paul Montgomery, Margaret Goodfellow, Anna Taylor, Iris Gould, Catherine Kickham, Christopher Napier.
Above | The culprit - Coronavirus (COVID-19).
Below | A fisheye shot of the United Church on 22 September 2020, showing two-meter social distancing and taped floor areas for each section of the choir.
Above | 20 October 2020, Eric Street from the Basses sets up our live-stream.
When we did return to indoor rehearsals, singing two meters apart on a cold winter’s evening was a challenge. Here’s how we introduced the October live-stream...
A very warm welcome to you this evening. And a warm welcome to anyone who's listening from home because we are live-streaming. In a moment, I'll take a photograph of everyone. That's for Track and Trace, just to make sure that we can explain where people were sitting in the hall if we need to.
Viewers at home will see that people here are not taking their outdoor clothing off. That's because it's rather cool in these premises with the mechanical ventilation on. So, you'll see people put a few more layers on. Carolyn will reach for a set of hand warmers and a hot water bottle during the course of the evening. And we've got the Winchester Mountain Rescue Team on standby if it gets really cold.
Thank you for the music?
But we’ve not done Abba! Never mind. The sentiment is perfect. We sing in a choir to enjoy music-making and the wonderful experience of performing and connecting with an audience. Over the next few pages we recollect some of those performances and the people who shared them with us. First, recollections of a very early concert in Old Basing...
WesangintheTitheBarn.Thisinvolvedawalk alongtheCanaltoreachtheBarnandsinging underthehighbeamedroofwithgrassunderour feet,givingoffapowerfulscent.Itwasdarkwhen weleftsowehadbeenadvisedtobringtorches.I’ll neverforgetthesightofthetorchesbobbingalong thebankbesidethedark,flowingwaterofthe Canal.
Top | One of the earliest photos of a concert performance - at the United Church Winchester in June 2008 with Sarah Morgan conducting. Bottom Left | Ex Steeleye Span, John Kirkpatrick performs at our Christmas concert in 2009. Honours for services to folk music.
Bottom Right | A drama. A rehearsal for The Way Through the Woods in June 2010.
IrisGould(Tunes)
thank you for the music
in memoriam
Above | We were at Space for Peace in 2010 when Angus Beaton took this photograph. A Rabbi and Imam, school and community choirs came together on Holocaust Day.
Above | Our summer concert 2017 marked the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen’s death. Jane died at 8 College Street and was laid to rest in Winchester Cathedral, nearby.
Above | With four Hampshire choirs and soloists, we remembered the lives and work of Sarah Morgan and Paul Sartin at the Theatre Royal in Winchester in February 2024.
Remembrance of people and events has been a recurring theme through many of our public performances - a few of them here
Left | At War’s Command was our concert title in the summer 2014, the hundredth anniversary of the outbreak of war in Europe. It was originally devised, arranged and performed by the a capella group, Craig Morgan Robson. Following the sudden death of Sarah Morgan in September 2013, the show was performed by Moira Craig and Carolyn Robson alone. In this performance they were joined by Winchester Community Choir and the show ended with a photographic compilation by war photographer, Angus Beaton.
For this concert, the choir’s selected charity was Combat Stress, the UK veterans' mental health charity.
We performed at Sarah Morgan’s memorial concert in 2014. Folk artists and friends of Sarah were there, including Belshazzar's Feastsinger/oboist/fiddler Paul Sartin and accordionist Paul Hutchinson. A decade later and Paul no longer with us, we celebrated his vibrant musical life in a concert produced by the Sarah Morgan Foundation.
collectors & publishers
George Gardiner is a giant amongst song collectors in Hampshire. He collected 1,400 lyrics across the county. Not always confident about noting the tunes, he would enlist the help of Southampton music teachers and sometimes music students during their holidaysone of them by the name of Ralph Vaughan Williams. What a holiday job! What a student!
We’re not sure that Lucy Broadwood collected in our county but one of her singers in Oxford, Mrs Vaisey, was Hampshire born and bred and learned her songs here, including the beautiful The Banks of Sweet Primroses.
Traditional songs, many from Hampshire, are an important part of the choir’s repertoire. Here we pay tribute to those collectors who discovered some of the songs we sing
Cecil Sharp was the most prolific collector and publisher in the Victorian/ Edwardian period. Volume 3 of his Folk-Songs of England features Hampshire songs collected by George Gardiner and set for solo voice and piano by Gustav Holst. Our Music Director, Zack Stephens has made a choral arrangement of one the songs from this collection, Sing Ivy, a song of ‘marvels and lies’ collected from William Mason in the village of Easton near Winchester. We performed it at our Christmas concert in 2024.
Heywood Sumner was an artist in the Arts and Crafts Movement. He came to live in the New Forest and collected a handful of local folk songs which he published in a beautifully illustrated book entitled The Besom Maker. We’ve slipped him into this little gallery of collectors, not because we sing his songs (yet), but because we will be under his gaze when we record our 2025 repertoire at St Paul’s Church, Winchester in the summer. Biblical characters crafted by Sumner in a small area of restored coloured plasterwork (sgraffito) will look down on us from the south chancel wall.
Seven generations of the Copper family have sung traditional songs from their native Sussex. There are several hundred songs in the Copper family repertoire, for example Come Write Me Down which the choir performed at its summer concert in 2023. But Bob Copper lived in Hampshire for a while in the 1950s and ran the H H Inn at Cheriton (now a private residence). He wasn’t a successful landlord. 'I should stick to folk singing, I think,' said Bob, recalling this period of his life in a BBC interview. While in Cheriton, he collected Blow the Winds I-Oh, part of the choir’s repertoire for many years in an arrangement by Sarah Morgan.
festivities & celebrations
At Christmas or a wedding, you can’t celebrate properly without a good tune
There haven’t been many choir romances, to our knowledge. But choir members John and Jane Wilson (pictured below) tied the knot in September 2011 at Winchester Register Office. CHORUS, then the choir’s newsletter, reported that ‘they sang Sweet Nightingale to each other during the ceremony and John sang Lavenders Blue during the reception.’ There you are. You never know when a good song will come in useful.
It’s a choir tradition to start Christmas celebrations with carols in the Inner Close of Winchester Cathedral. We always have to brave the weather...
Top | In 2006, the choir sings under the south cloister near Curle’s passage, sheltering from the rain.
Bottom | In 2022 on the performance stage at the Cathedral’s Christmas Market, wrapped up warm on a bitterly cold evening.
music makers
At its best, the choir makes a glorious sound. Thank you to all our singers, past and present who have made that happen. But of course, not all rehearsals have gone well...
The fifth section of the choir are the nonsinging volunteers. Since the choir began, they have made an invaluable contribution by stewarding at concerts, meeting and greeting invited guests, managing the sound system during concerts, taking photographs and video, and more besides. Many thanks to you all.
january 2025
First rehearsal of 2025 on Tuesday 7 Jan, 7:30pm
United Church Winchester
The start of our anniversary year and a great time to give the choir a try. There’s no audition and we offer two free sessions before we ask people if they would like to join us. The rehearsal will end with a social event and a stroll down memory lane...
may 2025
Saturday 17 May, 7:30pm
Littleton Memorial Hall
With the Burnt Hill Band and caller, Freya Tabbush, we’ll have a party to celebrate our birthday. It’s a bring-and-eat event with drinks provided at the venue.
Free to members. £10 for their guests
SMF is the Sarah Morgan Foundation
The Stephens/Gould commission
Our Music Director Zack Stephens and resident poet Iris Gould (Tunes) collaborate in a new song to celebrate the choir’s 20th birthday. We give the new piece its premier at our summer concert.
supported by SMF
The online store
Our Music Directors past and present have made some fantastic arrangements of traditional songs and some entirely new compositions. Their work will be on sale to singers and choirs through our new on-line store in 2025.
june 2025
Friday 6 Jun, 5:00pm
Meet outside cafe area of the ARC, Jewry Street
Led by local history buff, Elaine Howells (Tops/Tenors)
- a walking tour of central Winchester to sites with choir or musical connections, finishing at the Guildhall about 6.30pm.
Members only and FREE
july 2025
july 2025
Tuesday 1 Jul, 7:30pm
United Church Winchester
Our anniversary concertsongs from and about the city and Hampshire. Performers
Carolyn Robson, Moira Craig, Freya Tabbush, together with Ysanne Bonner make a return visit to the choir.
Tickets £12
supported by SMF
Saturday 5 Jul, 11am-5pm
St Paul’s, Winchester
Christine Arriens (Tunes) and husband Julian bring the expertise and resources of their video production company to this shoot. We’ll sing songs from our summer repertoire and Chris Brown will record audio.
Members only and FREE
Tuesday 8 Jul, 7:30pm by the banks of the river Itchen
Joan Dartnall (Tunes) and her husband, Rodney, host choir members and guests in their beautiful garden. There may be singing!
Members only and their guests and FREE
november 2025
october 2025
The commission supported by SMF
We plan to commission a new piece by an acclaimed composer of choral and vocal music. Keep an eye on our website for more details.
december
2025
Wednesday 1 Oct, 7:30pm
Hampshire Record Office
George Gardiner collected 1,400 traditional songs in Hampshire. Find out more about this rich heritage in a lecture and performance by Bob Askew and the Askew Sisters. With drinks after.
Tickets £12
Saturday 15 Nov, 10:30am-4:45pm
United Church Winchester
A fun and inclusive singing workshop followed by a concert. Music will be taught by ear in luscious four-part harmony.
Members £20
Non-members £30
Concert only £10
Tuesday 16 Dec, 7:30pm
Winchester College
Celebrate Christmas with us and our guests, the Andover Museum Loft Singers and TakeNOTE Chamber Choir.
Old meets new in this special venue and in the repertoire of these three Hampshire choirs.
Tickets £12
I’m so pleased to be leading Winchester CommunityChoirinits20thanniversaryyear. Wehavenewmusictolearn,someofitnewly commissioned and to be heard for the first time in our 2025 concerts. And, of course, we’ll revisit our established repertoire that our singers and audiences love to hear. It will be a pleasure to tackle these songs with a choirthattakessuchdelightinmakingmusic.
Zack Stephens
Zack’s musical journey began at aged 10 with Hampshire Music Service where his outstanding potential as a violinist was quickly recognised. With the award of two scholarships he was able, at 16, to study music at Queen Mary’s College, Basingstoke and take additional lessons from internationally renowned violinists, privately and at the Guildhall School of Music.
Zack auditioned successfully for a number of the UK's leading music colleges and accepted an offer to study Violin Performance at The Royal Birmingham Conservatoire where he obtained a BMus (Hons) degree.
Currently Zack has a highly varied teaching career, giving masterclasses and workshops, teaching his own private classes, and also teaching on the faculty of Queen Mary's College as professor of violin, music theory, and composition. More recently, he has found much enjoyment in choral conducting and is the principal conductor and director of two of Hampshire's most beloved choirs: the Andover Museum Loft Singers and us! He also founded and directs the QMC Vocal Consort. Zack takes great pride in leading these groups and often composes his own works and arrangements to showcase their unique qualities.
Zack became our MD in 2024, initially as a locum when Carolyn Robson fell ill. We were delighted to appoint him to the substantive position in May 2024. We look forward to many exciting, creative and enjoyable years with him at the helm.
