Donegal County Council’s Intergenerational Choir, Ceol Le Chéile, is bringing sunshine to this dull day with their latest release.
Their Zoom performance of ‘Here comes the Sun’ is another triumph for the members aged from 7 years old to 90+ years.
Watch here:
Ceol le Chéile was established in Feb 2018 with members from all over Co. Donegal including, Ballyshannon, Ballybofey, Glenties, Fanad, Inishowen, Letterkenny , Milford and everywhere in between!
It is an initiative of the Donegal Age Friendly Strategy, which aims to provide opportunities for social participation for older people, and promote inter-generational, social inclusion and cross community activity, between all ages.
Pictured at the Launch of the “Here Comes the Sun” Video by Ceol le Chéile are Charles Sweeney Donegal County Council, Veronica McCarron Coral Director Ceol le Chéile and Lisa O’Hagan , Social Inclusion Unit HSE
Covid19 and the lockdown in March 2020, prevented the choir from continuing with weekly practices at LYIT with Choir Director, Ms Veronica McCarron – However the choir members were anxious to continue with rehearsals, so weekly practice was taken online, via Zoom meetings.
Online choir rehearsals are challenging and not completely conducive to singing together. However with choir lessons recorded and posted to the Ceol Le Chéile private Facebook group to allow choir members to practice, prior to the weekly Zoom meetings the choir continued successfully. This was organised and set up, by our Choir Co Ordinator, Ms Kathleen Bonner.
In May 2020, the choir recorded ‘Three Little Birds’ as part of the Bealtine Festival for 2020. It was so successful, achieving almost 10,000 YouTube views, that Age & Opportunity invited Ceol le Chéile to record a video for the Bealtaine Festival, in 2021.
‘Here Comes The Sun’, by Beatles member, George Harrison, was selected. The purpose behind this song choice, was the uplifting lyrics which complimented the sense of hope around the world, as countries near the end of the Covid pandemic nightmare.
Recording a Zoom video poses many challenges, both musically & technically, with the majority of the senior choir members having little previous IT technical skills.
The recording of their performance was therefore a daunting task for many members. However, continuous support and clear instructions were given on portrait/landscape mode, body position, attire, lighting etc. Choir members were initially asked film a mimed performance to the vocal backing track. This allowed everyone to ensure they had the correct lyrics, syncopated rhythms, and engage facial & body energy. This is always important in a performance, but vital in a Zoom performance, where communication is so much more difficult. The final vocal performance was then filmed. This proved to be a great exercise, and resulted in the most engaging, confident, & animated performances from every choir member!
The project was a tremendous amount of hard work for all concerned, but so much knowledge was gained, on filming techniques, performing, lighting, and communicating with a virtual audience! And a great amount of FUN, SATISFACTION, & SELF ESTEEM, was experienced by one and all!
Charles Sweeney, Donegal Age Friendly Programme Manager, speaking at the launch of the video, stated that it was a marvelous achievement to be able to retain the choir project during the restrictions when many of the members had to cocoon, and to move the activities of the choir online, and to support the choir members in doing so, meant that the group dynamic had been retained and they were able to continue to sing and record music.
Ceol le Chéile is a collaborative social inclusion initiative, led by Donegal County Council and supported by the HSE, Healthy Ireland, Creative Ireland, Letterkenny Institute of Technology and Local Link.
