Lincoln Sounds

Ladies Barbershop Chorus

A Pocket History of Lincoln Sounds 

 

 2005 – What an exciting year it’s been.  Apart from the usual round of singouts and social events, in September the chorus was invited to ‘The Wedding of the Year’, when our Director Alyson Allan finally made an honest man of Lace City Singers Director Glenn Chaney.  Alyson and Glenn found out why our two choruses hadn’t been doing ‘homework’ – we’d been working on a joint rendition of ‘Chapel of Love’ as a surprise.  We also ran our first ‘Sing in Harmony’ workshop, supported by a grant of £600 from the Lincoln Community & Learning Chest via Urban Challenge, in which we offered a free ten-week 4-part harmony course to the ladies of Lincolnshire, which was a great success, resulting in 15 ladies joining the chorus

Convention in Plymouth was highlighted by a visit and workshop from the Rich Tones.  The weekend was one of mixed fortunes for us, coming a creditable 11th, notwithstanding many of the chorus falling ill with ‘the Plymouth bug’, and an overnight hospital visit for one member.  The numerous coach stops on the way home to allow our unfortunate sickies vital ‘bucket and bathroom’ stops was taken full advantage of by the rest of the chorus as ‘car park singing stops’, much to the delight of other travellers. Some of the chorus actually crossed paths with the Rich Tones in a motorway restaurant which, naturally, resulted in an impromptu sing.

2004 - Convention was a great success with ‘Over the Rainbow’ and ‘Goody Goody’.  We sat in the auditorium with all the other competing choruses as the details of the first winners were called out – “The winner of the Vi Steele Trophy for Most Improved Chorus, with an improvement score of 99 points is . . . . LINCOLN SOUNDS’!

 We were absolutely delighted and couldn’t wait to pin on our blue Most Improved ribbons – and have a party, of course!

We sang for the first time at the famous Lincoln Christmas Market. It was fun to be there, but the singing conditions were difficult!!  The stage was extremely small and having to share it with the men of Harmony Lincs was something of a numbers problem – but we thoroughly enjoyed singing to the thousands of visitors to the market, many of whom had travelled from across the world to be there.  We continue to appear regularly in the local papers and on the radio.


2003 – We continued to perform at an increasing number of local functions and competed, as usual, in the Lincoln Music Festival, singing ‘Goody Goody’ and ‘Goodbye Means the End of My World’ when, once again, the men beat us by one point!!  This is becoming something of a friendly needle match now, but one which we all enjoy enormously. We took part in the Radio Lincolnshire Going for Gold Concert at the Theatre Royal, as well as their Christmas pantomime. There has also been a great deal of fund-raising to replenish the kitty after the expenses of 2002.

Convention took place in Glasgow, with Claire Gardiner coming over especially for it. Unfortunately it was a disappointing result for us – our lowest score to date – a real motivation to DO BETTER NEXT TIME!

2002 - Over the course of the year we sang to 13 local clubs, charities, etc, including 2 weddings.  We took part in the Lincoln Music Festival again and this time we won by 1 point from Harmony Lincs and at Convention in Southport we came 9th overall. We put on our first concert, supported by a Lottery grant, to celebrate the Queen's Jubilee - a sell-out success (which didn't cost the audience a penny and left them asking for more!) - and on 11 September we joined sister choruses from around the workd as we 'Sang for Peace' in the Chapter House of Lincoln Cathedral.  We were interviewed by BBC Radio Lincolnshire and took part in their pantomime.  We had 2 educational visits, one from Jo Oosterhoff (UK and Ireland Regional Education Faculty) and one from Clare Gardiner, MD of Vienna Falls Chorus, Virginia, USA.

2001 – We were successful with our Awards for All Lottery Bid which enabled us to run our first public workshop.  The Chorus competed in the Lincoln Music Festival in March for the first time and were beaten by the men of Harmony Lincs by two points. We also competed at Convention for the first time, in Southport, where we came 14th - a credible result we thought, and a thoroughly enjoyable weekend. At our Charter dinner, held at the Washingborough Hall Hotel, we had the first winner of our annual LOTY (Lady of the Year) award. Because of a full Christmas schedule the dinner actually took place in January 2002. Jenny Bird took over as President in April.

1999/2000 - The Chorus sang at Convention for evaluation purposes only. It was a great experience, even if terrifying initially, and we were rewarded by receiving our Charter in December 2000, presented to our President, Debbie Watson by Linda Bracegirdle from the Regional Management Team. We celebrated with a huge party, unfurled our new banner, made ourselves a large birthday cake, and had a great evening with family and friends. We also had a name change to Lincoln Sounds – snappier and easily remembered!   We were, by this time, beginning to be known locally, and were singing out at various functions all around the Lincoln area.

1999 - The Chorus took the decision to apply for membership of Sweet Adelines International, and the process of evaluation began with visits from the Regional Management Team to ensure the administration, as well as the music, were up to Sweet Adelines standards.

1996 - Alyson Chaney (Allan as she was then) became the Musical Director of Lincoln Sounds. She has sung with medal-winning chorus Lace City Singers from their beginnings 15 years ago and is also part of the gold medal-winning quartet Sound Bites. She had been involved with helping Lincoln Sound Impressions (as we were first called) get off the ground, but had not been a director before! Luckily for us she offered to take us on as our Director and we have benefited from her wide experience ever since

October 1995 – This is when it all began. Most of the original members were the wives of the men’s barbershop chorus, Harmony Lincs, who came regularly to watch their rehearsals and thought they could do it better themselves!! The men were very generous with their help and encouragement as were the ladies of Lace City Singers in Nottingham who got us off to a fine start. Their Rosie Rogers is our only honorary member and still comes whenever she can with support, encouragement, help and good advice.