At The Strangers’ Choir, all you want is love for music and concord

On Sunday morning, round fifty folks collect on the Apparo Galleries, looking for snug spots on the chairs, stools and the ground to settle in for the subsequent three hours. On the centre is a keyboard, and musician and vocal coach Medha Sahi drifts round in an unhurried loop. We’re a bunch of strangers, some assured and excited, and a few, largely nervous concerning the prospect of singing and remodeling right into a choir of strangers. “I’m glad that each one of you might be right here and able to put yourselves in a susceptible place,” Medha laughs.

Earlier this 12 months, Medha began The Strangers’ Choir in Goa when she actually wished to sing with a bunch of individuals. “I despatched a textual content to this neighborhood artwork group I’m part of in Goa and requested if anybody was up for coming collectively to sing. I used to be so overwhelmed by how enthusiastic folks had been since I bought ten responses instantly. Eighteen folks nevertheless lastly confirmed up and that is the way it began; with a bunch of strangers who had been prepared to take an opportunity on an concept that didn’t exist,” she says.

There are not any auditions and no prior music expertise is required to be part of this expertise
| Photograph Credit score:
S Poorvaja

The thought right here is straightforward. Medha proclaims the dates for each metropolis she is to go to, and has folks signal as much as be part of this pop-up choir. I discover myself in Chennai with a bunch of strangers, a lot of whom together with me have completely no music expertise. There are not any auditions right here to concern, and all one wants is a love for music, one thing folks right here appear to have in abundance. “In Chennai, you will see that the very best singers,” a participant proudly tells Medha, who could be very impressed with our preliminary vocal heat up with‘The Lion Sleeps Tonight’.

There’s a sluggish however positive reducing of inhibitions right here after the primary hour. Individuals are attending to know their neighbours (Medha strictly forbids folks from sitting subsequent to folks they already know), and there may be palpable pleasure after we get our tune for the day — ‘Pink Pony Membership’ by Chappell Roan. After just a few chaotic minutes of determining whether or not we’re excessive, low, or medium on the pitch scale, we’re divided into teams to study the tune.

Medha says from expertise, she has seen how rapidly folks come out of their shells when it’s a giant group. “You possibly can barely hear your self sing, so that you aren’t conscious about what you sound like,” she says. As we study the lyrics and sing after her, Medha’s vitality stays persistently excessive. “I at all times inform my college students and my choir that the silliest individual within the room will at all times be me. So, you are able to do no matter you need, and I really feel like this kind of places folks relaxed,” she laughs.

Singing as a bunch does put us relaxed, and we’re largely amazed at how effectively all of us sound collectively as a bunch that doesn’t know one another. Having travelled throughout the nation to cities together with Bangalore, Mumbai and Delhi with the choir, Medha says the vitality of every metropolis is completely different. “Whether or not it’s the quantity of people that flip up, or the venue and even the native meals I get to get pleasure from after, each metropolis has been an journey,” she says.

Medha is hoping to take The Strangers’ Choir to extra cities within the coming months, and a second season will see one other go to to Chennai as effectively. “Music is such an inherently human high quality that it simply exists with everybody, and that is what I feel the choir is all about. The enjoyment of music is one thing that doesn’t must solely be skilled by people who find themselves skilled, gifted or gifted; it’s simply one thing that makes us folks,” she says.

An hour and a half of practising later. We’re all prepared. Medha begins taking part in the tune on her keyboard, and a room of fifty voices sings again with full gusto. “Pink Pony Membership, I’m gonna carry on dancing on the Pink Pony Membership.” We’re all smiling at one another, snapping our fingers and stamping our ft. Not likely a bunch of strangers on the finish of all of it, and one step nearer to turning into fearless singers.