As the name suggests,the event happens in a licensed venue. No preparation is required – no one knows which song they’ll be learning until the night. Jorgensen does try to choose songs that most people will be familiar with – “I want it to feel like they’re ahead”. Previous songs include Alanis Morissette’sYou Learn,Mumford and Sons’Little Lion Manand Queen’sI Want To Break Free.
Jorgensen tries to keep pub vibes for the shows,which usually feature an acoustic guitar played by Sahara Beck. This tour,she’s taking one song – none other than ’80s anthemAfrica by Toto– and teaching itat all 18 tour locations. Each show will see a different instrument added,and,at the end of the tour,they will be pieced together in a video,a compilation of 18,000 people from across Australia.
“Anyone is allowed to buy a ticket and turn up,it’s a different crowd every night … at the end of the night you are a performer. You walk in as an audience member and by the end of the show you are transformed into something different.”
She loves the democratic nature of choir. “In an orchestra,you have to buy a flute or a violin,with choir,you turn up with your body and the singing comes from you,” she says. “No matter how weird or out of tune you might be,there’s no other voices like yours. That is the magic. That is the thing that I am chasing when I make music with other people,we are the instruments.”
Regular Pub Choir attendee Cara Spencer sang in the Victoria Children’s Choir as a child but hasn’t sung in public since. “Obviously I love to belt out a few hits in the shower or in traffic on the way to work,to the delight of my co-commuters,” she says with a laugh.
The 45-year-old corporate communications specialist has been to Pub Choir shows four times,along with friends from her mothers’ group and their initially sceptical,now-converted husbands.
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“It’s so accessible,it doesn’t matter how much skill you’ve got,how you sound or whether you’re totally tone deaf,” Spencer says.
“Everyone feels like – no matter who you are,where you come from – you’re all working to the one thing. You’ve never met these people standing next to you,you’re all on this same journey and all of a sudden,within an hour,you’ve gone from having no idea what you’re about to do to making something really beautiful. It’s a real sense of achievement and joy that comes from that.”
Next month,Jorgensen is touring Pub Choir to the UK and then the US. Audiences are different everywhere – even within Australia – but she has noticed more friendly teasing here,whereas in the US,audiences tend to look for praise. “In America,there’s a bit more of a singing culture,but they don’t laugh as much.”
She wants to celebrate making music,to show it’s something everyone can do and benefit from. “Everyone is good enough to try,everyone is good enough to have a lovely time. Life is fleeting and we need to let go of being the best.”
“It’s really low-key,high return,you can just do your thing and you’ll get carried by the crowd. It’s really nice to be not that important,” Jorgensen says. “No one can be the best at choir.”
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