Newbie alto and already-our-new-section-leader (yay!) Jeremy tells us about his first Pride experience as a Pinkie…
It was 1972, the 1st of July, when the first official UK Gay Pride was held in London. Marches had taken place from 1970, traversing parts of North London, but it was on this day, chosen as the nearest Saturday to the anniversary of the Stonewall riots, that around 2,000 people converged on London. They came to march, protest and fight for the rights which are fast becoming our 21st century reality.
Some of my fellow Pinkies were there, and I bet they could hardly have imagined what Pride would be like a little over 40 years later. We were certainly extremely happy and indeed proud that they were still there, and with us! Marching side-by-side with the giants whose shoulders we stand upon, was a special experience that I’m sure we’ll keep forever. The theme for Pride this year was ‘Pride Heroes’, with various ‘everyday people’ being rightly lauded for their work, visibility and stoicism in the moves toward equality.
I realise not everyone likes the way Pride goes now, but I guess it was ever thus, the day I see an entire community agreeing on one thing is a day I shan’t hold my breath for! For what it’s worth, it seems to me that a day where people seem to be smiling a lot more, where there is a greater diversity of gender expression and identity, and where couples of all sexualities feel able to do something as simple as holding hands without fear of violence , still has a huge amount of positive worth in it.
The day dawned bright and warm, and most importantly dry. Many of us had been caught in the downpour of Pride 2014, memories of soggy socks and drooping fairy wings had made us extra-happy to see the sun put in a strong appearance from start to finish. We marched together in the parade, banner billowing in the breeze and helium balloons with minds of their own causing scenes of general hilarity. We sang songs from seasons past and present, and the crowds obliged us beautifully by joining in. A notable favourite was the timeless classic ‘Relax’ by Frankie Goes to Hollywood, which has been quite brilliantly rearranged by our very own Chris Chambers, for our Summer concert on the 11th July.
I had chosen the day to try out my new 1950s-style pink rockabilly skirt, and could be seen twirling and dancing a little ahead of the main body of Pinkies with a few others, handing out flyers and stickers to the friendly (and at times vaguely bemused) crowds. The optimism of the crowd was tangible. Only a day after the US Supreme Courts ruling on same-sex marriage, with Ireland’s joyful referendum outcome still ringing in our ears, it seems we are in a great position to be actually brimming with pride, whilst also mindful that we can’t hang up our marching boots just yet…
So, we danced, we sang, we acquired a parade gatecrasher with a lovely alto range, in short, it was a blast. At the march’s end, we received goodie bags containing gratuitous amounts of officially named (by our very own Kate Nichols and Chris Viveash) ‘Fancy Gay Coffee’, we headed straight to the crypt of St. Martins in the Fields to rehearse for our big moment. We appeared on the main stage in Trafalgar Square in the early evening. At 6.40pm, we were waiting backstage as I was changing into my red stilettos, as you do. I am now known as ‘Dorothy’ to many choir members… Anyway, there I was, with the shock of having just spent a penny in a portaloo still leaving my system, when the glorious Sandi Toksvig started practising her speech not three feet away from me. I had met her once before, when I was wearing pink glitter dress shoes, which Ms. Toksvig and I named my ‘Vagina Shoes’…but that’s another story.
Sandi was on just before us, giving the most rousing and heart warming speech I’ve heard in a long time, naming everyone there as her ‘Pride Heroes’. We completely agreed, they were the most exuberant and welcoming crowd we could have hoped for. The performance was over in a flash, good things always are, but we sang our hearts out and they seemed to enjoy it. Our classic rendition of ‘Vogue’ went down a storm (i’ve a sneaking suspicion there might have a been a few Madonna fans in the audience, but I may be wrong), and we rounded it off with a song thats coming up in our Summer Concert ‘Key Changes: Songs that Shaped the World’ at St. John’s Smith Square in London on Saturday the 11th July. If you want to know what song, you’ll have to come to the concert…
This is my first season as a ‘Pinkie’, and I can honestly say it’s one of the best decisions I have ever made. When I first marched at Pride a few years a go with another (brilliant) organisation, all I could think about were the many people I had met in my life who had done everything they could to stop me from being there at all. In 2015, all I could think of, and all I could see, were thousands of people who were happy to see us. Thank You Pinkies…I cannot wait until next time!
See more of our photos from the day here!
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Hand In Hand with Pride
Following a wonderful weekend in Brighton at the Hand in Hand Festival, tenor Philip reflects on the song that gave the festival its name, and looks forward to Pride in London on the 27th June, with its theme of Pride Heroes.
As of April I have been with the Pink Singers for 28 years, which is about 70 in gay years. In that time I have sung many different pieces, from the classical to the camp, from the profound to the political, often in the same song! Some continue to have a very special meaning for me. This is the story of one of them, Hand in Hand; a song which has become almost an anthem for the Pink Singers.
Hand In Hand was written by American composers Dawn Walker & Tricia Rodgers in 1987. I first heard it when the Pink Singers sang in Denver, Colorado in 1992 at the Gay and Lesbian Association of Choruses Festival. Around 60 choruses from the US and Canada attended with the Pinkies representing Europe (alongside Schola Cantorosa from Hamburg). Those were difficult days both at home and in America with anti-gay legislation and the impact of AIDS hitting us hard. In this context the words of the song struck a chord with us and we brought it back to London. It soon became a favourite with our audiences and the title of our first CD. The live version on that recording still brings a lump to my throat.
Hand in hand
We’ll be the strongest we can be
If we learn to stand by those in need
With shoulder pressed to shoulder
We will build a mighty wall
And nothing in the world
Can make us fall,
If we stand, hand in hand.
A particularly poignant performance took place at the memorial service in St Anne’s Churchyard, Soho, for the people who were killed and injured in a nail-bomb attack in the Admiral Duncan pub in Soho on 30 April 1999. The bar in Old Compton Street, at the heart of London’s LGBT+ community, was packed with drinkers at the start of the bank holiday weekend. Two people were killed and over 30 injured. The Soho community gathered together a week later and the choir led the singing with Hand in Hand.
In 2004 Pride London was founded. And over 30,000 people were tempted to central London for a parade and rally in Trafalgar Square. Pride gives the LGBT+ community the chance each year to celebrate, demonstrate and show visibility and support to people still coming out. By 2004 some felt the event had lost focus with overblown ticketed pop festivals undermining the purpose of Pride and alienating many groups in the community. The first London March was in August 1971 organised by the Gay Liberation Front and we ended up then in Trafalgar Square where I took part in a piece of street theatre called “Choosing the Chicken”(!) about the age of consent.
Pride 2004 was an attempt to return to grass roots and as such the Pink Singers were asked to open the afternoon’s events in the Square by singing “Hand in Hand”, the perfect song for the occasion. We sang it again in 2005, this time closing the rally with the words on the big screen for everyone in the square to sing along. Seeing the crowds in the Square from the stage under Nelson’s Column is very thrilling, a forest of raised joined hands in a real display of the song’s message.
In July 2013 we invited LGBT+ choirs from around the UK and Ireland to help us celebrate our thirtieth anniversary with a festival of song which we called Hand in Hand. We were joined by 17 LGBT+ choirs and individual members of other choirs at the Troxy in East London for a memorable evening of choral togetherness. Never did the words of the song seem more relevant.
We are delighted that the Brighton Gay Men’s Chorus and Rainbow Chorus have carried on the festival and successfully hosted a wonderful weekend – see Ben’s reflections below for more! #HandinHand
Hand in Hand Hits Brighton
The Pink Singers went to Brighton to join 17 other LGBT choirs from all over the UK and Ireland at the second bi-annual choir festival, Hand in Hand. Bass Ben give us the low down…
The Pink Singers hosted the first festival back in 2013 at the Troxy, London and we’d been looking forward to the next one for months, so I was really excited to be escaping from work early on Friday afternoon to head down to the coast for a great weekend of singing with friends old and new.
Hand in Hand is like a bubble of workshops, concerts and socialising. There’s lots of singing and not a lot of sleep. Our Friday evening started at the Old Ship on the seafront where we met some of our fellow choirs, nearly all of whom we’ve performed with in the past. In the 9 years I’ve spent in the choir I’ve been privileged to meet some amazing people all over the country and it’s always brilliant to see familiar faces coming together.
Bright and early on the Saturday morning we were off to Brighton Dome to register. A few hours later and after a couple of workshops (“Asian Jazz Improvisation”, anyone!?) it was time for the first of the main concerts which was preceded by the first ever Brian Kennedy Long Service Awards. As one of the two original founders of the Pink Singers, Brian did a huge amount of work for the gay community in London and created a place for people to come together and sing. Incredibly, his legacy lives on today in the Pink Singers that I am proud to be a part of and I’m incredibly grateful to him and Mark Bunyan for deciding to get a group of singers in a room and start note bashing. During the awards it was brilliant to see so many singers who have sung in their own choirs for ten and twenty years. I look forward to my bronze medal at the next Hand in Hand!
We were delighted to open the evening concert to a packed house full of friends, family, and participating choirs. I was really proud to sing two of my husband’s arrangements –’Smells like teen spirit’ and ‘Relax’. Our songs were incredibly well received and hearing the applause from an audience who really know what it’s like to be part of a choir and singing with your friends on stage was a brilliant moment, even for a cynic like me.
Our performance was over in just a few minutes and we were able to watch all of the other fabulous performances from the likes of our hosts Rainbow Chorus and Brighton GMC, Diversity, Sing out Bristol and the Deep C Divas. Whilst all the performances were brilliant, two really struck a chord for me: LGMC’s performance of ‘Through the Barricades’ accompanied by a video of the difficulties many thousands of LGBT people continue to face around the world was a stark reminder of how lucky we were to be sat in a concert hall packed full of people who have the liberty and freedom to be honest with the world about who they are, largely without any difficulty. In addition, formed as part of the campaign for a yes vote at the Irish same-sex marriage referendum, Tá for Grá gave an equally moving (if a bit more lighthearted!) performance of ‘Sew on a sequin’ reminded us to be fabulous, even when the going is tough.
I left Brighton on Sunday knackered, hungover, sounding a little hoarse and ready for an early night. More than anything else, I left feeling happy and lucky to be part of such an amazing group of people. The next Hand in Hand takes place in Manchester but isn’t for two whole years! It seems like an eternity to wait, but we’re already looking forward to it.
The Pink Singers started the Hand in Hand series in 2013.
Timeline datestamp: 11 June 2015
Happy 32nd Birthday To Us!
We celebrated our 32nd birthday this year, with a fun, colour-block themed party and a cake with enough e-numbers in it to ensure we’ll still be buzzing in time for our concert on 11th July!
In fact, tickets for the concert are now ON SALE!
Can a song shape the world? Join us as we explore the link between music and history, showcasing a variety of musical styles in St John’s Smith Square – one of London’s most atmospheric and beautiful venues. With music at the heart of change, the show will highlight many significant moments in history, through the suffragette movement to the HIV/AIDS crisis; from Monteverdi’s early opera to record-breaking chart toppers.
The show will also feature the wonderful Hinsegin kórinn – Reykjavík Queer Choir – in their debut London performance.
Click here to book!
Pinkies do Mallorca!
The Pink Singers have just returned from Spain’s first gay chorus festival in Mallorca and what a time we had! Get the low-down on parties, pride, palm trees and performances from soprano Louise and newbie tenor Keith as they relive their favourite Mallorca moments…
Louise’s Mallorca Moments:
Wow! Such fun! Where do I start?
There are quite simply TOO MANY stories to tell! I’m getting a little stressed just thinking about telling all you avid readers of the Pink Singers blog just how amazing it is to go on a foreign trip with the Pinkies. How can I condense the entire experience into a few short paragraphs? Waaah! What’s that I hear you say? Relax? PINK SINGERS SAY RELAX? OK. Relax. Because I can now, after a hectic, inspiring, exhausting, humbling, exciting, sun kissed weekend on the beautiful island of Mallorca.
This was my first trip abroad with the Pink Singers and the more I get to know the members of the choir, the more I feel that I am a member of the wide and much loved Pink Family. I felt extremely privileged as a teacher to have been granted some unpaid leave by my very supportive head teacher and to be topping up my tan during term time….oops, I mean singing with three other wonderful choirs at Spain’s first gay singing festival – the Mallorca Gay Chorus Festival!
At the first sound check I felt daunted that we would be performing three times in three days. I really wasn’t sure of the choreography and I was anxious that my claps, steps, swishes and step digs would be out of synch and I’d come at the wrong time. Aarrghhh! But when you get into the swing of it, it all falls into place, all the hard work pays off and you just want to put on a tip top show for the audience and the other choirs.
Wow! The other choirs! We loved meeting them and hearing them sing – the incredible Barcelona Rainbow Singers, the mesmeric Equivox from Paris and the inimitable Mallorca Gay Men’s Chorus. We felt such great support, love and passion from and for the other choirs and I love knowing that I am part of a dynamic and vibrant international LBGT community. And what a treat to sing in three different venues in Mallorca – the first being a castle surrounded by mountains basking in the setting Mediterranean sun! And all of this live on Mallorcan TV!
This was the start of a rollercoaster of performances, parties, raspy sex noises, strange fluorescent green drinks, forgotten shoes, forgotten trousers, standing ovations, sleepless nights, legendary dancing (you know who you are), Pride (In The Name of Love) on repeat, cava on the beach, wishing we had one more day…..
Alas, we couldn’t have done it without the hard work and dedication of two much loved choir members Charly and Albert who organised, reorganised, negotiated, waited, telephoned, translated and smiled patiently to ensure that the Pink Singers had a successful and thoroughly enjoyable trip. So thank you from the bottom of our Pink hearts for making it all happen!
Keith’s Mallorca Moments:
Being picked up at the airport and driven straight to the venue to perform is probably the closest I’ll get to knowing what it’s like to be Beyonce. Having just landed for the Mallorca Gay Chorus Festival, the evening would be my initiation into life as a fully-fledged Pink Singer.
The superstar treatment didn’t stop at the airport pick up though. The Festival’s first evening was to be an open air concert held in a castle set amongst stunning scenery. On arrival, it was straight to a sound check in the warm breeze, between rows of palm trees, as the sun set around us.
The starry evening allowed no time for me to feel any nerves about popping my cherry as a Pinkie. The Mallorcans had rolled out a real red carpet experience and we were presented to Spain’s media before a reception with the officials of Andratx, the town where we were performing first.
The Pink Singers had jetted out to Mallorca at the invitation of the Mallorca Gay Men’s Chorus. Taking part in three performances over three nights, we were joined by choirs from other European cities. There were the tres chic Frenchies, in the form of Paris’s Equivox, with their energetic conductress, sexy sounds and tight performance.
Then there was the Barcelona Rainbow Singers, with traditional ‘coplas’ which had me wishing I could speak more Spanish. With each flick of their fans, they sang wonderful tales of love and drama, the meanings of which I could only imagine. Of course there was the Mallorca Gay Men’s Chorus too – a gorgeous bunch of guys who know how to party as much as they know how to get the audience going. Their version of Bad Romance will always be the most memorable for me.
The festival culminated in an evening of electrical atmosphere at the Trui Theatre in Palma. The turn-out, support and energy of the audience made it hard to believe that it’s been just two years since the Mallorca Gay Men’s Chorus formed.
The final performance hit home for me what an amazing event I was taking part in. It wasn’t only a chance for a bunch of people who love to sing to get together, it was an opportunity to raise the positive profile of the gay choir on their island. It clearly meant a lot to our hosts, and did to me too.
Having nervously stepped up to audition for the Pinkies just ten short weeks before the Mallorca Gay Chorus Festival, it was a surreal experience to be performing with the choir. My most recent steps onto a stage were probably 23 years ago before I’d even hit my teens, so I’m sure there were bum notes, missed cues and lyrical slip-ups throughout.
Despite any performance mishaps, the Pink Singers really made me feel part of the Pinkie family in Mallorca. While the superstar experience was pure fantasy, what was very real was the chance to feel part of a group of such wonderful people and amazing performers, as well as the opportunity to celebrate with other gay choirs from around the world.
So how was that as my initiation into choir life? Pink Singers, I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I’m glad you were the one to pop my cherry!
Timeline datestamp: 07 May 2015