In 2017 I was invited to be David Brophy’s assistant Musical Director for a choir he was putting together in Leitrim, which would be comprised of singers over the age of 60 and under 12. The project would be filmed and broadcast in December 2017 as David Brophy’s Choir Of Ages, which proved a huge hit.

The choir was based in the New Ballagh Centre in Rossinver, Co. Leitrim, and following completion of the filming, we decided to keep the choir together under the new name of the Ballagh Choir of Ages. Since then we’ve performed loads of concerts, learned tons of songs, made a music video, and had endless amounts of fun.

And then Covid happened. We couldn’t rehearse together, and we couldn’t meet up for our regular chats over tea and buns in the Ballagh Centre. So Sarah Bronkhurst, the manager of the choir, and I had to get creative.

Sarah began sending weekly emails to the group, featuring local news, occasions such as birthdays etc., and interesting online content she felt the choir might find interesting. Meanwhile I began initially making ‘line tape’ videos for some new songs we had begun working on, so that people could sing along with them and learn their new parts. When I finished doing those, I began making regular ‘Singalong Videos’ featuring songs that the choir members themselves would suggest, and I’d include a bit of chat too. Sarah would then send out the link in her weekly email. One of these is posted above – the song is In My Life by the Beatles.

I collected all the videos in a Youtube playlist, and it now stands at 27 videos. Some of these songs might become part of our repertoire when all this unpleasantness is over, and many of them were just fun to learn, play and record. I know they’ve been helpful and useful to the choir members though, and indeed to me, during the past year or so of lockdowns.

With thanks to the Reconciliation Fund and the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, for making this possible during the COVID lockdown period.