Choir in a week - Deposit

Price
Course price: £650
Includes all teaching Monday - Friday, all optional afternoon workshops, shared supper on Tuesday evening, Nos Lowen on Tuesday evening, day trip with coach travel on Thursday, shared celebration lunch on Friday, recordings of your songs, bespoke songbook with sheet music and lyrics, tea coffee and delicious cakes each day we are at AMATA. Does not include accommodation, see details below to add this on.

Accommodation price: Various options are available at different prices that we can help you to arrange. We have agreed discount codes with several lovely sea-view hotels for use on this course, and we can also provide reservation details for other options. Please contact us via this form or via emailing shortcourses@falmouth.ac.uk to get a list of suitable accommodation providers and we can help you to reserve your room for this course.

Course details

Join us for this creative week of unaccompanied harmony singing led by 2 experienced choir leaders, based in professional facilities at the Academy of Music and Theatre Arts at the University of Falmouth.  This year our Thursday trip is to visit the stunning St Michael's Mount where we will be singing in various locations around the harbour and gardens, followed by an opportunity to sing in the gorgeous acoustics of the chapel at the top of the castle.

Choir in a week is led by Pip Wright (Kana Kernow) a singing leader, teacher and community musician based in West Cornwall & Jane Harris, choir leader, singer and Director of Songways from Bath.

For full course information please see this course details page, and the specific activities for this year are below:

Monday:
Morning: Full singing session with Pip Wright and Jane Harris
Afternoon: Optional afternoon singing workshop in a lovely local church. This year our Monday workshop will be a Soul Soundings session led by Jane Harris in the open space of the church, exploring the resonance of the building with opportunities to sing freely while immersed in the group sound. Jane runs these singing sessions in exceptional sacred spaces with comments from previous singers including "Food for the soul… inspirational" and "Fun, inclusive, moving, magical…"
Evening: Free time

Tuesday:
Morning: Full singing session with Pip Wright and Jane Harris
Afternoon: Optional afternoon instrumental workshop for anyone who plays an instrument, learning easy tunes for our Nos Lowen this evening.
Evening: Shared supper, then Nos Lowen with a caller

Wednesday:
Morning: Full singing session with Pip Wright and Jane Harris
Afternoon: Optional afternoon singing workshop in a lovely local church. This year our Wednesday workshop will be a Songs with Spirit, Songs for the Soul session led by Pip Wright in the open space of the church. This is a deep and joyful experience of meditative harmony singing in a beautiful acoustic, connecting with ourselves and with each other through harmony and song. We sing in a circle, filling the space and ourselves with resonant harmonies.
Evening: Free time

Thursday:
This year, our all-day trip is to visit and sing at the iconic tidal island of St Michael's Mount in West Cornwall. Coach travel is included from Falmouth University. Please note this island trip location is weather dependent, and if the weather is dreadful (very high winds or extremely heavy rain) our trip will be different but no less lovely - see information below.

We'll arrive in Marazion in the morning and will walk over the ancient cobbled causeway together (a 5 minute walk) to the mount. We'll be met by our guide for the day and will start by singing in locations on the beautiful village harbour, beneath the ramparts of the legendary castle. After lunch and plenty of time to explore and unwind, we'll sing again at the base of the beautiful terraced gardens. There'll be free time to explore the gardens and then an optional guided walk up the hill to the castle, enjoying the breathtaking views along the way and hearing about the fascinating history from our guide. For those who want to, we'll reconvene on the top castle terraces in the mid afternoon for our final singing session, which will be in the absolutely gorgeous Church of St Michael & All Angels at the top of the island. Finally, we'll walk back down to the harbour together and hop aboard ferry boats to return across Mount's Bay to Marazion (a 5 minute journey) and we'll then head back to Falmouth via coach. 

Important weather information about this trip
St Michael's Mount is surrounded by sea and accessed via an ancient cobbled causeway (at low tide) or by a short boat trip. For this reason, it's very weather dependent and the island can close in extremely high winds or stormy weather conditions. We are visiting in July, when weather conditions are usually settled. If the weather is dreadful and we are not able to visit the island, this year's course will instead take a different trip on the Thursday of the course to Falmouth town (via coach from the University campus). Pip and Jane will teach new repertoire in the morning in an extra singing workshop in a beautiful town-centre church in Falmouth. We'll have a break for lunch and exploring, and then in the afternoon we've been invited to sing in the gorgeous acoustics at the National Maritime Museum. We'll sing in the galleries and then have plenty of chance to explore the fascinating museum with a guided visit. Finally, we'll head back to the University campus via coach.

Important accessibility information about this trip

St Michael's Mount is an ancient, rocky, rugged island and can be tricky to navigate if you have limited mobility. Please take a look at this detailed accessibility guide on their website when booking your place on this course. There is 1 'tramper' vehicle available which can navigate the village and harbour areas and we can book this in advance with plenty of notice. Our first singing location of the day is on the harbour so this will be possible via this vehicle. However, the terraced gardens and the steep / stepped path up to the castle are unfortunately not accessible. If you have accessibility concerns, please contact us before booking your place on this course and we can advise about options.

Friday
Morning: Full singing session with Pip Wright and Jane Harris; followed by recording session with the AMATA technical team at Falmouth University to record all the repertoire we've sung during the week so that you have a record of what you've learned to take away. Mp3 downloads will be sent to you following the course.
Late lunchtime: We'll end with a shared celebration lunch together and the course will finish at 3pm so that there's time to travel home.

Some comments from previous course students:
"Truly extraordinary complementary double act of leaders”  
“Their styles really complemented each other.. so clear and encouraging” 
“Loved the variety of songs and appreciated the vocal training and tips” 
“Joyous singing.. inspired teaching” 
“Outstanding – full marks!” 
“It’s hard to pick anything out that I enjoyed the most – all fabulous!”
“Exceptionally good!”