Pub Choir: Brisbane grassroots event where everyone’s urged to sing
Once a month, hundreds of people gather in Brisbane bars to learn to sing without fear of being judged | VIDEO
On a Thursday night in Brisbane’s inner city, a queue consisting of several hundred hopeful people hugs the wall outside a music venue. Just before 7pm, however, word filters through to the back of the line that these people, sadly, have missed out on securing a coveted spot inside and will have to seek entertainment elsewhere.
It’s a curiously busy night, as there is no band booked to play inside, and no pre-booked tickets. Instead, the room soon will be filled with the sound of musical instruments that the 800 or so attendees carry with them everywhere.
Most of them use these instruments in private — in tight spaces such as their car, or in the shower — but they rarely get an airing in public.
This, then, is a rare exception where for one night each month such musical expression is not only encouraged but expected.
In fact, it’s the entire reason for being here, for this is Pub Choir, a grassroots community event that posits anyone can sing: just add a little alcohol, and the comfort of relative anonymity within a crowd of people who are likely to feel as awkward about singing in public as the person standing beside them.
The pop songs the organisers choose are well-known — past selections have included the likes of Cyndi Lauper, Crowded House and Ben Lee — and when the final performance is filmed and published online, the results are uniformly pleasing and often moving.
Something about this concept evidently has proved irresistible. Perhaps it’s simply the sheer rarity of the sight and sound of hundreds of strangers gathering for a couple of hours with the sole goal of using their voices in tandem, for a common purpose.
At a cost of $10 per person — which covers venue hire, crew payments and song licensing fees — the novelty is such that, suddenly, Pub Choir has become one of the hottest tickets in town.
Last month the impromptu singers scored a surprise viral hit when their 500-strong performance of the 1994 song Zombie by Irish rock band the Cranberries was shared around the world, including by the band in question.
That stirring singalong — recorded on February 8 at the Elephant Hotel in Fortitude Valley — was especially poignant and potent, given the sudden death of the band’s singer Dolores O’Riordan in January.
Within a month, the Zombie footage had attracted 4.5 million views on Facebook.
This all started a year ago, when three friends followed through on their idea of bringing strangers together to sing. That first show saw about 80 people front up to the Bearded Lady in Brisbane’s West End to sing Slice of Heaven, the 1986 hit by New Zealand singer and songwriter Dave Dobbyn.
About half the audience at that first show consisted of friends of the three co-founders. Tonight, footage from the first gathering is played on a screen above the stage at the Triffid, a venue in Newstead that can accommodate about 10 times the number of people who sang in the first choir.
As Slice of Heaven finishes, the bulging crowd cheers on its predecessors, while a woman in a sparkling black top takes to the stage with a microphone in one hand and a beer in the other.
“As you can see, I featured in that video, ’cause there was space back then!” begins Meg Bartholomew, tonight’s MC.
“We started this a year ago in an empty apartment, on a picnic blanket. We thought, ‘We want to start a choir for our friends. We’ll call it Pub Choir so they can drink. Then our friends will definitely come.’ Look at all our friends now! This is ridiculous! Stop telling everyone this is cool!”
Bartholomew introduces singer and guitarist Waveney Yasso, whose shirt bears an Aboriginal flag, to perform a welcome to country.
Yasso shares vocals with a slight woman named Astrid Jorgensen, who wears bold pants and red lipstick, and completes the trio of co-founders.
After instructing everyone to take a couple of steps closer to the stage so a few stragglers left outside can enter the room, Bartholomew takes control.
“Thanks for coming,” she says, smiling. “Now, now, everyone, we’re all trained teachers, and that’s enough chat. You’re having fun, and that’s good, but respect the space that you’re in. We’re a bit nervous. There’s a lot of you.”
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Projected on to the big screen is a rudimentary diagram whose arrows direct the crowd members to shift into one of three groups — men, “high ladies” and “low ladies” — with the adjectives referring to their vocal range rather than their stature or state of intoxication, as Bartholomew sharply clarifies.
Each group will be taught to sing different harmonies and lyrics, while those perched on the venue’s balcony are encouraged to follow whichever part they want to sing, as they’re a little too far from the action to benefit from direct instruction.
Bartholomew raises a glass in tribute to tonight’s bumper crowd, then cedes the stage to Jorgensen. “My name’s Astrid,” she begins. “I talk too fast, but I’m very enthusiastic. This is Waveney; she often interprets the mean things that sometimes leak out of my mouth. We’re a good yin and yang.”
From this point on, Jorgensen fulfils the role of choir director with great skill and poise, and no shortage of colourful language.
“The whole idea of Pub Choir is that singing is easy and we care about it way too much,” she says. “Let’s do a little experiment. I’ll show you how easy it is to sing. Open your sound hole — your mouth, by the way, you sick bastards — as wide as it goes and now make a noise.”
The director makes the sound that doctors generally ask of you during an oral examination, which the crowd dutifully replicates. “There’s nothing much more involved with singing, but let’s step it up a notch,” she says. “Let’s try the traditional warm-up.”
With Yasso playing chords on an acoustic guitar, Jorgensen begins singing the chorus melody to Hey Jude by the Beatles, but replaces the song title with “Pub Choir”.
It’s an accessible way of encouraging the group to open their sound holes, as everyone in the English-speaking world knows the melody, and it sounds beautiful when performed en masse. As the crowd continues singing along, she addresses the high and low ladies with variations in harmony, so that each group gets a feel for what will be asked of them during the next couple of hours.
“We have an amazing Brisbane song,” Jorgensen says. “Do you know My Happiness?” The crowd cheers. “We’ve come up with a teensy little arrangement, only for the people in this room here tonight.”
Of course they know it: released in 2000, it remains the best-known song by local rock band Powderfinger. Conceived as a story about the absence and loneliness that comes with the life of a touring musician, it is often mistaken for a love song and has been played at plenty of weddings as a result. It won song of the year at the 2001 ARIA Awards and topped the annual Triple J Hottest 100 poll in 2000. On the PowerPoint slides overhead, the three vocal groups are split into red, green and blue lines, indicating their separate lyrics and melodies. Once Jorgensen begins instructing, while Yasso strums chords to drive the rhythm, something magical starts to happen.
The director’s amplified voice is beautiful — as you’d expect of a professional singer and music teacher — but a surprising side effect is that it encourages her 800 students to strive to match her level of beauty.
When the men follow her wordless melody for the first time, they are met with a big cheer from the opposite sex, who greatly outnumber the men. Any single blokes in attendance may not stay that way for long.
“Pub Choir women are very, very easily pleased,” notes Jorgensen.
The low ladies sing the evocative opening lines: “I see your shadow on the street now / I hear you push through the rusty gate / Click of your heels on the concrete / Waiting for a knock coming way too late.”
When the three groups combine their parts in full voice for the first time during the pre-chorus, the effect is spine-tingling. “So you come in and put your bags down / I know there’s something in the air,” sing the men. “How can I do this to you right now? / If you’re over there when I need you here.”
There sure is something in the air.
It’s the power of hundreds of voices singing as one, belting out a few lines and a winning melody with which most Australians are familiar. It’s the emotional impact of using an instrument that we all carry yet rarely feel confident enough to use around others.
During the course of an hour, Jorgensen alternately guides each group through the entire song. Thanks to her excellent instructions and clear arrangements, there are only a few hiccups, which are quickly corrected.
As the blokes’ lines overflow into the night’s first all-in chorus — “My happiness is slowly creeping back / Now you’re at home …” — there’s simply nothing else for the singers to do but raise their voices at the sheer joy of it all.
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Before its first full run-through of My Happiness, tonight’s Pub Choir is encouraged to take an extended drinks break. Backstage, Jorgensen has a few quiet moments in the airconditioning with her co-founders. The director looks a little frazzled as a result of the energy she has expended while instructing the largest crowd of her career. When she and Yasso return to stage, they are greeted by the sight of several jugs of beer and spirits-laden trays near their feet.
“Here’s the plan,” says Jorgensen. “We’re going to review a couple bits of the song that are a little bit shit. We’ll spruce them up because, ladies and gentlemen, this is one night only. We will never do this song again.”
After about 10 minutes of tweaks, the director says: “Now, we’re going to sing through the whole song twice. But I feel like it’d be more special if a member of Powderfinger joined us on stage. Ladies and gentlemen: songwriter, bass player, Triffid owner extraordinaire, Mr John Collins!”
Out walks a man who has heard My Happiness more than almost anyone else on the planet. Carrying his daughter’s acoustic guitar, Collins grins and basks in the crowd’s roar.
“Everyone’s got their phone out. Take a piccy!” says Jorgensen. “Now, put your f..king phone away and sing!”
And they do. The room falls silent as Collins strums the opening chords solo before being joined by the three distinct vocal groups.
Considering the rather piecemeal way the song was taught, it is remarkable how wonderful it sounds with the three parts put together.
“If you hear a f..k-up, it was definitely not me — it was JC,” Yasso says after the first run-through.
“He just learned the song this afternoon!” Before the final performance, Collins says, “Thanks to Astrid for bringing Pub Choir here to the Triffid, and thanks for having me.”
This last take is the one that will be published online. Jorgensen returns the microphone to its stand and becomes an energetic conductor, moving across the stage to direct the three groups. With training wheels removed, the choir nails its performance.
It sounds fantastic, and the group knows it: the mood is ebullient, as everyone in the room rides an extraordinary natural high that can be achieved only through sharing music en masse. When the footage of this performance is uploaded to Facebook in a few days, it will attract more than 77,000 views in its first 24 hours online.
The night ends with 800 people repairing to the beer garden outside, or trickling out into the surrounding streets and suburbs of Brisbane.
They each carry with them an unforgettable experience, a new take on a classic Australian song, and perhaps a new-found willingness to use their instrument in public.
Pub Choir will next meet at the Cultural Forecourt in Brisbane’s South Bank Parklands at 6pm on April 5.