About Ware Choral Society

Ware Choral Society is an amateur, community-based choir, with a current membership of about 70 singers. It was established in 1902, and registered with the Charity Commission in the same era, judging from the language of the stated aims attached to that registration: the study and practice of choral music in order to foster public knowledge and appreciation of such music by means of public performance and such other ways as the Society through its charity trustees shall from time to time decide! These days we might sum up our aim more simply as spreading the love.

For while we constantly strive towards professional standards, employing fully professional musicians to assist our preparation, practice, and performance, we are essentially an amateur choir, its members motivated by varying combinations of three loves – the love of music, the love of performing, and (mostly) the love and joy of singing. And while our performance of music will always seek to follow the detail provided by whoever wrote it, our priority, especially under the persuasion of our current Musical Director Rosie Howarth, is to communicate the spirit of the writing, and our love of it.

We generally present three local concerts a year, Christmas, spring, and summer, occasionally combining with other forces to perform further afield. Our regular concert venue is Ware’s Drill Hall, the space created in the middle of Ware in preparation for war – just in time for our establishment, perhaps providing some counterpoint to those preparations – but now devoted to the performing arts within the local community. Our repertoire is fairly standard choral fair, usually involving an orchestra to provide as much mix of texture as possible, and also a mix of well-known and new works to ensure the performances stay fresh, and we stay challenged.

Our base and rehearsal venue is the Riverside Hall, another community building in the centre of Ware, and one that epitomises the friendly character that is often attributed to us. We do not put prospective members through the ordeal of auditioning – all we ask is a willingness both to work towards that voice becoming the best it can be, and to contribute to the joy of singing. Hopefully the pages elsewhere in this website will provide further encouragement to prospective supporters, concert-goers, and singers.