Fron Male Voice Choir 'Voices of The Valley Live'

Introduction

There is one thing that should stir up great emotions in any Welshman's heart, especially when that Welshman is living the life of an ex-pat in London (ok, two things, but we'll wait for another Grand Slam next year before I mention that again), and that is the sound of a male voice choir. There are many stereotypical jokes about our love of singing, however bad (the jokes, not necessarily the singing), but as with most jokes, they are based on fact.

Traditionally, this type of singing brought a community together in harsher times, and the men generally came from steelworking, quarries and the mines (with a considerable input via the great religious revival in Wales around the turn of the twentieth century).

Côr Meibion Froncysyllte (Froncysyllte Male Voice Choir, in case anyone was confused), or the 'Fron' Choir, as its known - sounds 'Vron', before anyone starts with all these unnecessary Anglicised attempts at reading, began life as a post-war attempt as a competitive choir in the first International Eisteddfod at Llangollen in 1947.

They are by no means the oldest male voice choir in Wales, but still have 5 founder-members singing with them, so that's an achievement in itself.

They are now, arguably, the most famous choir of this type, and this is purely down to marketing and a lucky break (depending how you see it) in being seen by the ex-manager of 'Blue', who offered them his support. The rest is, as they say, history.


Audio

A decent enough sound, which could be descibed as 'surround' however there's little to excite you in the way of effects needing this setup. The recording balance is clear, although it's quite hard to get a piano and choir wrong. Ann Atkinson has a mic attached to her dress and also sings into a stand microphone. Whether this contributes to hearing all her flaws as a soloist is questionable, but the clarity is such that there's no hiding place for scrappy singing.



Video

Again, very good quality overall, but other things spolied the viewing.

Pleasant shots of the interior of St. Jude's make an effective background to some of the music, but I got the feeling that there were at least two too many cameras on the night, as the director seemed to switch between them too often, using odd angles, and giving the effect that the buttons were there to be pushed, whatever the outcome.

There is at least one camera operator who needs to go back to the drawing board though. Out of focus shots and sudden zooms just appear amateurish.



Extras

A short documentary accompanies the DVD which consists of a few vox pops by Ann Atkinson, the chairman, and a couple of choir members. Several mentions are made about the venues at which the choir have sung since the money came flooding in, but more could have been made of the history of the choir and how new members go about joining. Some careful editing would have made it all more satisfactory.

Three excerpts from the concert itself are also added (no idea why they weren't in the main' feature'), all of which involve Ann Atkinson as the soloist, and are reasonably effective, but I've definitely heard more moving versions of 'Dido's Lament', even with just a piano accompaniment.

Conclusion

As I mentioned earlier, it's probably a fairly dubious honour to be picked up by the ex-manager of 'Blue', but then again, for a choir such as this, and indeed for the genre as a whole, any form of popular publicity is a good thing....I suppose.

The Fron choir are not at all bad, but they are certainly not the best. I was lucky enough to be brought up in Swansea, where we had not only the great Morriston Orpheus, but also the fine men of the Dunvant Male Voice. Each of these are, or certainly have been, equal to the Fron, but without the mass marketing from Universal and Fremantle, will not end up on stage at the Classical Brits or sell double platinum albums while at the top of the 'Classical' Charts (I'm sure that one day there will be some of yer actual classical music there, but I won't hold my breath).

Carping aside, let's discuss the concert itself.

St. Jude's is indeed a great church. I've played there may times myself, and can vouch for the fact that the acoustics are superb. The only real issue I have is that it's miles away from any pubs, and this must have been a bit of a strain from some of the lads, understandably so.

The programme is basic male voice choir fayre, with some smatterings of Welsh songs and hymns and more popular styles, more or elss successfully rendered. Suo Gân, I'm pleased to say is particularly effective (also heard in 'Empire of the Sun', in case anyone wondered) as it's one of my favourites, and the great Arwel Jones hymn,' Tydi a raddaist' is always good to hear.



Others are not so successful, especially the dreadful 'World in Union' (not the performance, but the arrangement of the Holst tune itself, with some appalling lyrics), and a rather undernourished 'Battle Hymn of the Republic' whose introduction sounded like a speeded-up version of the 'Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves' from Nabucco. The great song 'Rhythm of Life' from 'Sweet Charity' is lively enough, but could have done with a Sammy Davis Jnr. bouncing on to really give it the drugs-fuelled boost the song demands.

Ann Atkinson is a friendly soul, who is able to get the audience on her side, and the choir obviously love her. She is not the best conductor in the world, and I was interested to see whether the choir could actually follow her when her arms appeared to swing around with no noticeable connection to the music being played and sung at the time. Mostly, they do, which is a good thing.

Overall, this is actually a fairly good gig, which is really only spoiled by the direction and camerawork. The choir is made up of a whole mix of people from a whole mix of occupations, and the quality of singing belies their amateur status but if you want to hear male voice choir concerts which will really blow your socks off, I would look elsewhere.