Commissions 2021 - 5 free choir songs & resources

In 2021, with funding from Creative Scotland, we commissioned five songwriters to write new songs in collaboration with five community choirs. Written during the pandemic, the free choir songs were created to be accessible for online teaching and learning, and are accompanied by professionally recorded audio and video resources to support both choir leaders and choir members. Each of the five choirs involved in the project has recorded their own version of the songs which gives a good feel for how they might be interpreted, performed and enjoyed by other choirs. Please get in touch to let us know if you’re planning on performing any of these songs with your choir; we’ll be glad to post about your events to our social media followers @lovemusicscot #lovesinging.

You are welcome to use, download and sing any of the songs and resources hosted on this site. They are shareable under Creative Commons license: “Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs CC BY-NC-ND”, meaning that any individual has permission to download the work and share it with others but without altering it in any way, using it to create derivative works or using it commercially.

 For each of the songs, you can access scores, screen sharing score, lyrics sheets, and audio tracks for each voice part, all parts together and backing track where applicable.

We’ve created learning videos for each voice part which have the lyrics to the side of a conductor, so that your singers can practise outside of choir rehearsals with someone leading and singing with them. In our lyric sheets, we use a comma to show where there is a rest in the music. We also show which voices are singing which words on the right hand side of the page. If you would like any of the scores to be transposed into another key for your choir, please do let us know and we’ll be happy to help.

Songs & Resources

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More about the project

The Love Singing project began as a response to the incredible work that community choirs across the country were doing to keep their communities connected and singing over the pandemic. They proved resilient, adaptable and willing to address enforced isolation by embracing new technologies; they rose to the challenges of delivering messy, complicated, socially distanced singing. They did this because they believe in their communities, the importance of staying connected and the power of singing together. Love Music produces Scotland’s largest community choir and as we became part of this journey we were inspired by the resilience we saw around us; we wanted to create an opportunity for ambitious and exciting creative collaboration and in doing so offer a seed of inspiration to help keep us all motivated and singing over those months.

What did the project offer?

• Five commissions to write a song especially for community singers
• An exciting opportunity to create, learn and sing new music
• A new song commissioned for and developed in collaboration with each choir and professional songwriter
• Accessible music resources recorded by professional musicians to support learning
• Opportunities to connect with and learn from other choirs and choir leaders
• Songwriters received support and mentoring from Stephen Deazley during the creation process to ensure maximum accessibility and impact for community musicians
• Support to increase online participation in choir
• Training and guidance throughout

What were we looking for in collaborators?

• Based in Scotland
• Songwriters who were already working at a professional level with an existing body of original works
• Songwriters with a desire to create music specifically for community singers of all abilities and levels of experience
• Choirs willing to address digital exclusion, and willing to test approaches to increasing access for isolated and vulnerable people, including those who would be unable to attend in-person rehearsals
• Choirs that share our ethos of inclusion, access, equality and celebration of diversity – non-auditioned choirs open to everyone regardless of skill level or experience
• A range of diverse choirs from across Scotland – in size, online experience and preferred musical style
• Choirs that were willing to meet online for regular rehearsals – they didn’t need prior experience meeting online as we offered support to achieve this

How the project progressed

Our recruitment panel selected the choirs and songwriters to ensure we are working with as wide a range of participants as possible. It was an intuitive process, reliant on the expertise of the panel, not based on a list of set criteria.

At the start of the project, we collected anonymous equalities, diversity and inclusion information from all involved. We also collected information about each choir’s level of comfort in accessing information and resources online, and talked with choir leaders about the ways we could support them and their choir members.

Songwriters were paired with choirs based on the information that each provided at the application stage. They had ample time and opportunity to get to know each other and discuss creative ideas for their songs, along with opportunities to test parts of the song as it was being written and developed. Stephen Deazley supported each collaboration throughout the artistic process and the Love Music team gave support with technical and access requirements.

We created learning resources for each choir that needed them and the songwriters were involved in this process. Resources included audio and video files of the music in each voice part, all parts together, and with backing track separately, ‘learning the notes’ videos, and scores and lyrics. Each choir received the level of support appropriate to their needs and to best fit their song.

The choirs recorded their own versions of their songs which were published on 10th Dec 2021, alongside professionally recorded learning resources, for other choirs to access, enjoy and sing.