Nicola Lisle asks Adrian Partington about conducting Oxford Bach Choir's Come and Sing event this weekend

If you fancy giving your vocal chords an extended workout, then this Saturday’s Come and Sing Verdi’s Requiem, organised by the Oxford Bach Choir, could be exactly what you’re looking for.

It doesn’t matter whether you’re an experienced singer or have never sung a note in your life — everyone is welcome to come along and give it a go.

The scratch event involves a day of rehearsals, followed by a performance in the evening with professional soloists. Wielding the baton is the OBC’s former associate conductor Adrian Partington, who has been invited back for this special event. “There’ll be two or three hundred people there, of all stages of learning and familiarity with the music,” he says. “I will rehearse them as best I can, have a bit of fun and then perform in the evening.”

Adrian has become something of an expert at conducting ‘scratch’ events — in fact, when I spoke to him, he had just conducted Mozart’s Requiem in Bristol, with over 500 people taking part, and was heading off to Cardiff for Brahms’ Requiem the following day. So is conducting such events a particular passion of his?

“It’s something that I’m asked to do a lot,” he says. “I do enjoy it, but I just like engaging with people and sharing my love for the music with them. It’s particularly popular with people who can’t commit to the week-by-week rehearsals choral societies require. “People come crazy distances to these things, too. In Bristol, one person had come from Newcastle-upon-Tyne. We also had people from Canterbury. So people who have the singing bug travel immense distances, and I’m sure there will be people like that for the Oxford event.”

Is the range of abilities at these events ever a problem? “It can be. I can usually tell in the first ten minutes what kind of group I’m faced with, and how fast they can go or how slow they need to go. But in six hours there’s a limit to what you can do. And normally the aim is to produce a performance, and that’s what people want — they need a sense of achieving something, and a notion of working towards something.”

Adrian has noticed a sharp rise in the popularity of singing since Gareth Malone arrived on the scene. “The number has risen in the last five years, definitely. The growth of community choirs has fertilised the more mature classical music choirs as well. Singing is more and more a thing that people want to do.

“There’s a recognition of the value that singing has. Singing is a physical activity, and it releases all sorts of chemicals and makes you feel good. “Then there’s the notion of shared enterprise, with everybody working together to produce a good result, and the immense satisfaction when that’s been achieved.”

This Saturday’s event will raise funds for the choir — a very worthy cause, Adrian feels. “The OBC is one of the oldest and most prestigious large amateur choirs in the country. It’s one of the pillars of the Oxford music establishment, and has given a lot of people a lot of pleasure. So it’s a thing that’s worth supporting.”

Come and Sing Verdi’s Requiem
St John the Evangelist Church, Iffley Road, Oxford
Saturday, 9.30am (workshops), 5pm (performance)
For details and to book tickets, visit oxfordbachchoir.org