Celebrating 18 years of voices, harmony and community.
New Performances are on the way. See our concert schedule below.
If the idea of being part of a wonderful choir interests you, join our rehearsals commencing Wednesday 4th February 3pm – 5pm at Bates Hall, Blackheath.
The Heathens are working towards their performance at this year’s Blackheath Choir Festival. For more information Blackheath Choir Festival.
Step into a night of rich harmony and heartfelt song as the Heathens Choir presents an uplifting celebration of music and community. With over 50 passionate voices, the Heathens will take you on a journey through a vibrant repertoire of folk-infused songs, tender ballads, soaring pop classics, and a touch of gospel. Your ticket secures reserved seating and includes a post-show gathering where you’re invited to join the choir for mulled wine, tea and coffee.
TICKETS GO ON SALE SOON Check back for further details
This post marks our 10-year milestone in 2019 — an important chapter in the history of the Heathens Choir.
2019 marks the 10th year that The Heathens have been singing together under the direction of Chris Wheeler and we will be celebrating all year by re-visiting old songs and learning new songs to share with our wonderful community. We have grown from a small group of 10 to a healthy choir of 50 plus in the last 10 years and look forward to welcoming any new comers who are thinking of joining this year.
Term 1 starts on Wednesday January 30!
We all know the wonderful benefits of singing – especially with others…but did you know that it can trigger memories in those who struggle to remember? This is a very interesting article…
www.abc.net.au/news/2018-08-12/singing-triggers-memories-for…/10106328
Welcome b
ack to Vera from her trip home to Hungary with the exciting news that her memoir – Red Danube – is now sitting on shelves in bookshops in Budapest! Congratulations!
We know Chris reminds us to practise between rehearsals…and perhaps some do! Here are some tips for those of us who don’t…or find it hard to do…
Congratulations! You’ve now been told for the millionth time to practice your music for your next choir rehearsal. But if you are someone who hears that and thinks, “I don’t play piano. I can’t do this without someone helping me,” here are some ways you can practice on your own and improve your singing.
Grab your music and a pencil. Many of these steps can be done in a public place. No need to head to the practice room (stop using that as an excuse).
You have the ability to do these ten things. Do them. You will reap the benefits of being more confident with your part, which will allow you to contribute to the ensemble in a more meaningful way. And your own vocal technique will improve, because you’ll be able to concentrate on how you sound instead of always worrying about how your part goes. You’ve got this.
-Doreen Fryling (lifelong practice avoider)
Check out this great article on the wonderful benefits of group singing…
http://ideas.time.com/2013/08/16/singing-changes-your-brain/
Our newest and youngest member to join the sopranos is Safira. Would she classify as a sopranino?
If you haven’t got your copy … The Heathens Book is available to buy for only $10 at Banc.
It is a beautiful collection of stories of the lives of the choir members. Each story is magical, unique and generously told and collectively, provide an insight into our time and place.
“May your voices take springs
there where fire burns.
May your songs put roses
there where battlefields lay.
Open furrow and sow love
to harvest fruits of hope.
Sing to liberty where despot rule,
Sing to equality where poverty nests,
Sing to love where hate prevails.
May your singing direct the world
so that peace takes over wars,
so that all will cherishes earth,
so that all race or color discrimination is banished
so that we will be together as sisters and brothers
so that this planet rejoices with your voices.”
Victoria came across this and thought you would all enjoy.
Here are a few hints to help with understanding the timing of music.
Firstly check the time signature. If the top number is 4 or there is a big C (for common time) then you have to count four beats in every bar. If the top number is 3 then there are three beats in a bar. Those are the two most common times which are used in our music.
A crotchet is a black note with a straight tail – it has the value of one beat. If you add a flag to the end it becomes a half beat and is call a quaver. Every time you add another flag it halves in value to become a semi-quaver, demi-semi quaver etc.
White notes are longer. A minim is a white note with a tail and has a value of two beats. Without a tail its a semi-breve with a value of four beats.
A triplet is when we squeeze three notes into the space that normally holds two. In the example here three half notes are squeezed into one beat (rather than two half beats) so they go a little quicker in order to fit
There is a similar system for rests. The squiggle has a value of 1 beat rest. The little flag is half a beat etc.
Get into the habit of counting in your head … we all do it to keep in touch with where we are in the music. Whenever there is a bar line the next note is “One” and starts the counting again. Practice and enjoy!
Last week we looked at three different types of progression which you can follow in the music, even if you don’t actually read music.
The simplest progression is a musical scale where the notes move from space-to-line and line-to-space and you simply follow the line of notes and go up or down a whole note with each move. They are not all actually whole notes but your brain is attuned to the major and minor scales in western music so you will do the half tones naturally when they come (though those are the ones which are most often a little out of tune).
Sometimes the notes are spread out in what is called an arpeggio. In the music we sing this is often the major or minor triad (1st, 3rd, 5th). Wollemi Pine is a great example of that – full of arpeggios.
The trickiest progression to sing is a chromatic scale where is movement is only a half tone. In these scales you see a lot of sharps (#) or flats (b) which mean move the note up half a tone (#) or move the note down half a tone (b).
Tony pointed out to me that a great example of a chromatic scale is the Aria Habanera from Bizet’s Carmen – a downward chromatic scale thats fiendishly difficult to sing in tune
I hope you all found the first little tutorial yesterday useful.
Unless I am democratically overruled 😉 I will try to give a little musicology snippet at the start of each rehearsal.
Once you understand your own musical range it helps you to pitch notes within your comfortable range and to prepare your voice when you can see that a note will be very high or very low.
We all have different voices but I have attached the pictures I used yesterday, giving what I think would be typical for each of the voice parts. Click on the image to make it bigger.
The picture also shows you a useful mnemonic to know the letters for each space on the stave – “FACE” for the treble clef and “All Cows Eat Grass” for the Bass clef.
Next week different types of musical progression.
Mick writes that we have just learnt of the passing of one of our early Heathens, Bob Rowe, after a long battle with brain tumour that caused him to go blind.
Bob was a pianist and singer who became more and more frustrated as he lost his sight. He tried coming back to the Heathens once he was given a seeing-eye dog, but it was all too much.
Bob was an accomplished academic (Newcastle University) and family man, and he will be remembered fondly by those of us who knew him.
Rachel Berry from Glee holding the last note of a rendition of Streisand’s “Don’t Rain On My Parade”
Bella has some tips for breathing technique
We all know that breathing correctly is essential for us all in the choir. How many of you have struggled to hold those beautiful long notes for some of our finales? Well, I can help with that. This is going to teach your body how to take in more air in a short amount of time. Here we go!
I guarantee if you do this properly you’ll see a massive difference and it will help ten fold! Trust me.
With thanks to my singing teacher Deb for teaching it to me! Bella
All good things come to an end. Frank has shared with us how singing makes you healthy, helps you to stay well and helps you to heal; how it makes you happy; and how its good for your baby (or someone else’s). So now lets all take a deep breath …
6. Singing Helps You To Breath
qi – the breath of life
Studies indicate that the breath control required for singing has a positive impact on asthma sufferers, enhancing lung function & helping children stay calm when they experience shortness of breath.
Hospital patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease have also been shown to benefit, with improved quality of life. Singing is associated with bigger lung volume.
Breathing can also be an emotional outlet for those with chronic disease.
So whether you are breathing a sigh of relief, breathing to relax or just breathing to stay alive, lets all thank Frank, for a very illuminating series of posts.
Chris reports on what to do with 10 grandchildren under the age of 10, all staying at her house for a few freezing days in the school holidays.
Take them bushwalking – anyone 4 years or older is officially old enough to go, if you have enough helpers … and carriers, when the going gets rough.
(there are three 4-year olds in this picture).
Take them to Jenolan Caves – two cave tours, the second one self-guided, with a picnic lunch between – what a great day.
Take them to the Megalong Tea House – see picture below – great for the kids, scary for the proprietors, 18 people descending and needing to be fed in a hurry!
Keep them warm – lucky that our house is a bit good for hide and seek, cubbies and the like. And keep them fed … now there was a never ending circus. Then go into hibernation for a week after they all go home. Whew.
Rob continues in a sporting theme …
Where would we be without our coach? How lucky are we to have such a talented and dedicated mentor to gently encourage us to explore and expand our vocal abilities with various techniques and activities, using them to accomplish the final outcome that is desires. With colossal patience and persistence she takes each team section through its individual part and then throws caution to the wind having all parts sing together. Don’t you love that facial expression when we reach the end and are feeling really pleased with ourselves? Her eyes look up to the right, she smiles, ever so slightly, frowns, pauses, and says…. Hmmmm Not Bad!!!!!!
Once we have mastered our individual parts, then starts the perfecting process with the addition of various dynamics and subtleties that suddenly bring the piece we are working on to life. At last we can sit up and feel good about ourselves.
Now we get that huge smile from the coach along with those wide twinkling eyes and a “Well Done – that was great”
You see we can do it !!!!
Stay tuned. There is more…. The Team Players!!!!!
Frank continues his series on the benefits of singing …
5. Singing Helps You to Stay Well
Singing is the perfect preventative measure & an excellent antidote to our busy, multi-tasking times. It reconnects the balance in our breathing, movement & living.
In Victoria, singing in groups is one of the most popular arts activities. This is helped in no small part by Community Music Victoria which promotes and facilitates music-making among Victorian communities. For the past 10 years CMV has provided singing leadership workshops, and they have also compiled a comprehensive list of articles covering a vast range of community music topics, with an emphasis on singing.
Meanwhile in NSW we may not have CMV but we do have Chris and The Heathens to help us to stay well.
Although now retired, Susie worked as a behavioural scientist and management consultant. In this capacity she established a consultancy working with a variety of groups and large institutions such as the Commonwealth Bank, Qantas and Westpac Bank, implementing her new ‘Lifestyle for Success’ program.
She has written a book Super Working which was the result of her experiences conducting workshops for government, business institutions, schools and other organisations both in Australia and overseas. She is still involved in groups such as Australian Ethical Investments and a number of environmental causes.
Susie has family in Nepal and is involved in conducting treks there which emphasise cultural exchange. Members of The Heathens recently participated in a singing trek to Nepal led by our choir director – Christine Wheeler.
Moving to the mountains was something Susie had thought about for a while. She moved to Wentworth Falls from Mosman in Sydney, in May 2012. The sense of community and a different attitude to possessions and appearance are attributes which attracted her. “In Mosman when people look at you they look from your shoes to your handbag but here there is more acceptance” she says. “I feel that it is an absolute privilege to live here”.
Susie sings with the sopranos – the choir has not only been a way into the community but it makes Susie feel “Uplifted. If you miss a note the choir still keeps singing”.
Contributed by: Cathy & Victoria
Talking of singing and healing … There was a great documentary on ABC a few nights ago:
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/bigideas/stories/2014/06/05/4019554.htm
Catch it while you can. The TedX talk will probably survive online a little longer:
http://tedxsydney.com/LIVE/?s=75#&panel1-1
If you google singing and healing most of the images you find are of Tibetan singing bowls. Those of us who went with Chris on the singing trek to Nepal earlier this year will be familiar with these and might have one sitting proudly on their mantlepiece.
Singing bowls are used in healing, but as we know in The Heathens there’s nothing to match the real thing – Frank explains how …
4. Singing Can Help You Heal
The connection between singing & healing, both spiritual & physical, precedes us by centuries & crosses over cultures. Aboriginals, Hindus, Muslims, Jews, Native Americans, Polynesians, Asians & Africans all embrace the power of chants & song.
In the ABC series, ‘The Choir of Hard Knocks’ the singer/conductor confirmed singing’s life-enhancing potential when he took a group of homeless people off the streets of Melbourne to form a choir that still performs to this day.
Nationwide recognition of singing’s therapeutic benefits is gathering steam, for example, a study at the University of Queensland monitors the success rate of their singing workshops for young women who self-harm. So far, 70% of the participants have stopped harming. It seems singing allows them to reconnect with their bodies.
Look out for Frank’s next installment of why singing is good for you.
Frank has already told us how singing makes you happy, and singing makes you healthy. In this third installment we find out that babies benefit from a good sing:
A mother’s instinct to sing to her baby is as ancient as civilisation itself.
Research shows the best time to start is while your baby is still in the womb. Singing to your unborn baby can also help prepare the mother for the act of giving birth itself.
Research article in Science Daily
Singing to infants helps promote cognitive & emotional development as well as enhance learning abilities. That’s the reason classic nursery rhymes have endured. A mother singing them to her baby will have a lasting effect on reading & writing skills, attention span, concentration & memory that no DVD or iPad app could ever match.
Thanks Frank, and my suggestion is that if you don’t have your own baby then sing to someone else’s.
Check out the next installment for more benefits of singing.
About age 10 at primary state school our teacher got each of us in turn to sing Do-Rae-Mi-Fa-So-La-Ti-Do. Yeronga was a very big school and she needed about 20 for the school choir so most of us failed and were told “you can’t sing – fall out and go back to class.”
I carried this chip on my shoulder (the chip became a caber over the next 70 years) until I was 80 years old, when a friend said “come to my choir, you don’t have to audition”.
I levelled with the choir director and said that I couldn’t sing but was told “just make a noise”. So I practised hard at home playing the bass parts on a keyboard purchased for the purpose. But she phoned me at work just prior to my first concert and suggested not to turn up for the final practice nor the concert since “some of us have symphony orchestra experience, don’t you know!”
Six months after being banished, I bumped into one of the other bases and he wanted to know why I had quit. I said it was the other way around – they quit me! But I heard they were about to do Handel’s Messiah which I had appreciated at Canterbury Cathedral at 
Christmas some fifty years earlier whilst in the Royal Navy, so I sang that and then announced my “ retirement”, having achieved a lifetime goal.
But the night I “retired” I realised that most of the choir were battlers and that none of the bases were much chop (the concerts were being carried by the soloists and the music). So I took singing lessons and persevered with that choir, started to enjoy singing (in tune on occasions) and joined The Heathens who were far more accepting.
Which prompts me to ask all other Heathens choristers:
LIKE ME, WERE YOU TOLD YOU COULDN’T SING? Do you have a story to share?
Contributed by: Harry
In his first blog Frank explained how singing makes you healthy. Now he shares the second benefit he’s found from the latest American Harvard & Yale universities’ research:
A university study over the last 12 years has examined the impact of choral singing across the spiritual, social, psychological & health spectrum.
It found that a major reason participants had such positive associations with their choral singing, was the sense of community & inclusion that group singing promotes.
It also revealed that group singing brings a sense of joy & accomplishment, substantial social networks, greater well-being, higher self-esteem & stronger bond with the community. You connect with your emotional self if you sing at home but singing with a group of people can make a stronger & more vibrant sound than an individual. You are able to feel a stronger sense of connection.
So … singing makes you happy and singing makes you healthy. Read the next installment to find out how singing makes you pregnant – or maybe I misread that!
We are usually busy practising our repertoire for the next gig – so it was a good idea by our Musical Director, Christine, to have a two- hour session with local maestro, the renowned and much loved singing educator and performer Richard Morphew.
Our ad. for new members in the local Echo says no experience required but dedication and serious application are the norm at The Heathens, and this resulted in a ninety percent turnout of twenty-six for Richard despite it being a cold winter Saturday.
Richard’s 50 years of international experience brought immediate results starting with a revision of the building blocks of how to sing and then he got us up to speed on a new item – a Harry Belafonte song for our next performance – in four parts, naturally.
To show Richard our general level of competence we first sang an old favourite – “Freedom is Coming” but it was not a patch on our usual – because we didn’t have Christine leading us on guitar (she was singing with the altos – you can’t have two Directors simultaneously). And Chris Arnott, the bass lead, was multi-tasking as per usual – getting morning tea organised – resulting in the basses being out of sync!
But a joyous and productive time was had and Richard’s wicked jokes on the side were appreciated – more than somewhat. Let’s see if we can get him again.
Posted by: Harry
Mick was born in Sydney and has had a long career as an academic at Sydney University in the specialised area of Biometry (the applied statistics for agriculture).
His work has taken him to Indonesia where he was involved in setting up the earliest computer systems in Bali. He has extensive links with universities in Indonesia and although retired still works as a consultant for Australian aid organizations, training staff and students to run computer packages. Mick’s work in Indonesia continues a long history of vital and valuable educational exchange between Australia and Indonesia.
He came to Blackheath with his family in 2008 to retire and to be part of his partner Christine Wheeler‘s music circle. When Christine established The Heathens in 2009, Mick joined as a tenor “to sing with Chris”.
Technical support is an important role in keeping the choir members up to date with the music they are learning. Mick’s work in the search for, and application of a suitable computer software programme – Noteflight – has resulted in the choir having the use of “a wonderful educational tool for musicians to teach people to read music” and to practice songs at home. Chris has described Mick’s role in the choir as critical, especially as the choir has grown so much.
Mick describes the choir as an important part of community life and a way of making and enjoying close friendships. It has also allowed him to sing harmonies again for the first time in 40 years.
Contributed by: Victoria and Cathy
Six benefits of singing, by Frank
Singing comes to us as naturally as breathing. Our Mothers sang to us from the moment we were born & we all did it freely as children. But these days, chances are most of us confine our joyous singing to the privacy of the shower or long drives in the car.
It’s time however, that we all discovered our inner ‘soprano’ because a growing body of research shows that singing can be as good for us as taking up yoga or going to the gym!
Here are the some of the benefits from the latest American Harvard & Yale universities’ research:
If you are applying the correct breathing technique, singing is an aerobic activity. It 
enhances lung function, improves posture, strengthens the diaphragm, increases the heart rate, boosts neurological function & stimulates circulation.
Singing can increase life expectancy & may even enhance your immune system.
Singing’s emotional benefits are equally impressive. The mood-lifting endorphins released 
while singing a favourite tune are similar to those triggered by a chocolate treat while the deep, controlled breathing required, eases anxiety. Singing also reduces cortisol, the stress hormone & distracts you from your worries & banishing, at least briefly, any feelings of despair, depression & even pain.
Here’s the best news, according to the research, all of these benefits are significantly multiplied when singing takes place in a group such as a choir or in Church.
Read the next installment to find how singing makes you happy.
Music and life
Whether you can read the intricate symbols on the page and translate them into amazing sounds on an instrument, via singing or not, many Blackheathans young and old, know the importance of music.
Musique concrète is a form of music composition which encompasses sounds from every day life within the piece of music. The sounds can be anything from train horns, the rush of cars on a highway, or even just crickets singing their night serenades to the moon. One thing that people who love music all know is that it is a powerful uniting tool, it can save lives, release repressed emotions, and be in anything we do on a day to day basis.
So next time you’re out walking, just stop for a minute, close your eyes, and listen to the world make it’s own never ending symphony. That’s what we are. We, The Heathens, are a choral accompaniment to a song that will last, very nearly, forever.
Contributed by: Bella
Harry was born in 1927 in Warwick, Queensland. Significantly he says, 1927 was also the year the Federal Parliament moved from Melbourne to Canberra.
From there it appears his life has been full and it continues to be so. Never doing anything by halves, his bass voice can be heard in two other choirs as well as The
Heathens.
It is evident from his account of his working and social activities that he has embraced life with gusto. After leaving school, he joined the RAN from 1947-1962 leaving as an electrical engineer. At the age of 33 he pursued a career in business and established his own very successful computer software company in the 1970s that employed staff of 200 consultants around Australia.
He had many other irons in the fire, including his own column in The Australian
newspaper, an endorsed Liberal candidate, a property developer and antique dealer!
Harry was also well known among the social milieu of Paddington and for hosting lavish
parties. Guests included Dame Joan Sutherland and Luciano Pavorotti who sang in his
living room which was known locally as the ‘Woollahra Entertainment Centre’.
He moved to the Blue Mountains for a quieter life and became a licensed tradesman, finally retiring at the age of 82. He enjoys a beer at his favourite watering hole – The Carrington Beer Garden which coincidently he built in 2004!
Described by Leo Schofield as a ‘latter-day Great Gatsby’, Harry maintains the colourful
aspects of his life in the many rooms of his lush and riotous garden in ‘Kozy Dell’ in
Katoomba. The motto on his garden gate is a bit of Homer; “He lives in a house by the
side of the road and is a friend to everyman”.
Contributed by Victoria and Cathy
On a cool, wet, typical Blackheath day the community gathered to pay its respects to Dawn Baker – an eccentric and much loved Blackheathen. There were eulogies from family and friends, The Heathens sang and people from across the community shared their personal accounts of how Dawn had touched their lives.
Several in our choir knew her well. Cathy spoke of the warmth of her love and their frequent encounters on the streets of Katoomba, Chris observed how eccentrics define our community and help us to rise above the ordinary, but perhaps most moving was the account by Philia and Frank of their last encounter with Dawn on Blackheath station.
“… out of the blue, Dawn said to me “I like you. You always treat me the same, always nice and always say hello…” I was flattered and touched by her kind words. I felt like a little girl who just received a Gold Star!
I’ll miss hearing Dawn’s “Hello Luv!”, and even her whinges. I hope she rests in peace now, and free from all mortal suffering.
God bless your soul my sweet cranky old friend! Congratulations on completing your journey on this Earthly plane. You made a mark in my life, and you are remembered.”
The Heathens sang The Parting Glass whilst family and friends placed flowers and shells on a special tribute table next to Dawn’s photograph. And then, as is the Blackheath way, we tucked into morning tea provided by BANC and Rotary.
Contributed by Tim & Sandra
We hope that you like our new website. Our aim is to provide information about The Heathens and our upcoming events as well as blogs about choir activities and members. There are password protected pages for our members and for our music.
If you have photos or Heathens news that you want to contribute please contact Tim.
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