About rehearsals

In general

• St Andrew’s Church Psalter Lane Sheffield. Scroll down for how to get there, parking etc.
• Recordings and practice tracks at Members Area / Rehearsals / Preparing the Music
• Advice about looking after your voice is at  Preparing Your Voice.
• Pre-rehearsal workshop at 6.30 in the room behind the altar – through the doors at the front of church, forwards along the corridor to the room at the end. Contact Georgina Hulse if interested.
• All members are welcome to congregate in The Stag after rehearsal, only a short walk from St Andrew’s. New members are particularly welcome.
• Many thanks for your consideration in not using your mobile ‘phone during rehearsals. Please nudge the person next to you if they forget; in emergencies please leave the room.
• There’s a fee for non-return of hired music, payable by the member whose music is missing (even if they passed their copy to a colleague). Sorry about this but non-returns continue to be an issue.

Click here to access the Rehearsal Schedule 

Location, parking etc

Tuesday evenings 7 to 9pm, from Sep to July, at St Andrew’s Psalter Lane Church, Psalter Lane

• For buses to St Andrew’s, see https://www.travelsouthyorkshire.com/.
• Car parking spaces available by arrangement only – please see Georgina Hulse
• Street parking for everyone else, see blue areas on the map below. PLEASE DON’T PARK ON CHERRY TREE DRIVE!
• Take bikes into the foyer.
• Toilets at front of church, through doors on either side, follow signs. Accessible toilet in the foyer.

Emergency Evacuation – On hearing the fire alarm, vacate the building via the nearest exit.  Assemble in the street but away from the building. If you discover a fire, press the nearest alarm.

Attendance requirement

Please note that, to uphold the very highest standards, Darius would prefer members to commit to each one of our official concerts  in any given season, wherever possible. The training he provides is designed to help the choir continuously improve, irrespective of the upcoming concert. He can teach particular points of singing technique just once, knowing he can rely on us to apply them in future performances of other works.

He therefore expects members to do their best to attend every rehearsal, even if they are unable to sing in a particular concert.  He prefers those unable to sing in a concert NOT to attend the compulsory piano/conductor’s rehearsal so that he and/or the visiting conductor can hear what the Chorus will sound like on the day.

Committing to each concert is a good way of supporting colleagues so that there’s always a full complement of singers, especially for less well-known or more challenging works, rather than relying on a core group of singers.

However, illness and family or work life do sometimes get in the way, so people who can’t attend every rehearsal are not prevented from singing in concerts. However, we do need to maintain standards, and those who have missed around a quarter of rehearsals will not be able to sing in the concert – and they MUST attend the conductor’s piano rehearsal (usually held on the Tuesday before the concert) and the final (orchestral) rehearsal (usually held on the day of the concert).

Members should ideally keep an eye on their own attendance to ensure they qualify to sing, but if you are not sure whether you have attended enough rehearsals please contact your Voice Rep (addresses below). Your Voice Rep should in any case contact you if your attendance is dropping significantly.

There is no need to send apologies if you have to miss a rehearsal; non-attendance will be taken as an apology. However please tell your Voice Rep if you are unable to attend a particular concert. But, as noted above, you are still encouraged to continue to attend all rehearsals except the final conductor’s rehearsal – and as stated above, it is hoped that most members will commit to all the concerts in any given season, and to all the relevant rehearsals.

By the time the compulsory conductor’s piano rehearsal comes round, we are expected to have mastered the works so that the conductor can concentrate on interpretation. This requires members to:

• mark their copies with all instructions that the Music Director has provided over the rehearsal period
• do a certain amount of rehearsing at home; you will find information and advice, including links to rehearsal tracks, on our Preparing the Music page.
• look after their voice; for information and advice, including vocal exercises and warm-ups, at Preparing your Voice

Singing lists are generated in the final weeks before a concert and include every member who has not sent their apologies AND has attended, or is on track to attend, at least 75% of rehearsals OR has been given special exceptional permission to sing (see below). Members with low attendance will be contacted before the singing is generated.

If you discover you have not attended enough rehearsals to be included on the singing list, please speak to your Voice Rep (see list below) who will contact the Membership Officer Marianne Grayson, to seek permission to sing. Marianne has some discretion, but if you fall outside this she will contact Darius on your behalf. Please make sure you make your appeals via your Voice Rep rather than going to someone else – and especially don’t appeal directly to Darius as he doesn’t have easy access to attendance records.

Please register your attendance at all rehearsals, scanning in with your membership card at the register desk on arrival. If for some reason you are unable to do this, please sign the sheet on the desk so that your rehearsal attendance record can be maintained accurately. However, please try not to forget your card, as these manual sign-ins create extra work.

Voice Reps

Voice Reps will follow up anyone who has been attending but is at risk of falling below 75% and has not sent concert apologies.

Voice Reps are also the people to consult for anything else: questions, suggestions, comments, feedback and complaints.

Anyone who wishes to see their attendance record may do so at any time, by request to their Voice Rep in the first instance.

For a list of all the Voice reps, please go to Chorus contacts

Compulsory Rehearsals

There are usually at least two compulsory rehearsals.

• The piano rehearsal or conductor’s rehearsal. This is the first opportunity for the visiting conductor to hear how the chorus sounds and it is obviously vital that everyone on the singing list is present. It is also the opportunity for the conductor, whether visiting or our own Music Director, to put his or her own interpretation on the performance and to check compatibility with the orchestra and soloists. It is often held on the Tuesday immediately before the concert, but may sometimes be the previous week. All rehearsals designated as piano rehearsals on the rehearsal schedule are by their nature compulsory.
• The orchestral/band or ‘tutti’ rehearsal. This is often the only opportunity for all the performers to rehearse together, so everyone must be present. For Saturday concerts the tutti rehearsal is almost always held on the afternoon of the concert; members are generally required at the venue – usually the City Hall of course – from 2pm for two hours. For Friday concerts it is often held one evening in the week before the concert, and is not usually in Sheffield, but in the city or town where the orchestra is based. For example, when singing with the Hallé on a Friday, the compulsory orchestral rehearsal is at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester on an evening of the week before the concert; for the Royal Northern Sinfonia the venue is the Sage in Gateshead. The chorus provides coaches to these compulsory rehearsals, financed from Chorus funds.
• Absence from one or more of the compulsory rehearsals  means that special approval to sing in the concert must be obtained from the Music Director; applications should be made via the Voice Reps.
• Although Darius encourages everyone to come to all rehearsals, whether they are able take part in a concert or not, he asks those not able to sing in any particular concert not to attend the compulsory rehearsal(s) so that he and/or the visiting conductor can hear the Chorus as it will sound on the night.