A few years ago my friend and I realised that we both loved singing but didn’t do enough of it. So we started a weekly acapella group with just four members. After a year we invited others to join. We didn’t insist on musical experience – in fact some of our members had never sung before. Now the group has ballooned to around fifteen people.

Now, the reason I’m going to try to persuade you that you should start your own acapella group is because I believe that singing is the key to long life, a good figure, a stable temperament, increased intelligence, new friends, increased self-confidence, heightened sexual attractiveness, and a sense of humour. There! That got your attention. But it wasn’t all made-up: a thirty-year study conducted in Scandinavia sought to discover which activities seemed to relate to a healthy and happy old age. Three stood out: camping, dancing and singing.

…

IF I WERE asked to redesign the British educational system, I would start by insisting that group singing become a central part of the daily routine. I think it builds character and, more than anything else, it encourages a taste for co-operation with others. This seems to me about the most important thing a school could give you.

-Brian Eno

RTWT

Me? I’d prefer to have music in front of me, rather than winging it, as Eno suggests … but I can harmonize without it if necessary. As long as I know the tune.

Thanks, a cappella news, for alerting me to this!