Ōamaru woman Sally Randall would like to teach the world to sing - in particular, those who have been told they can’t.

Sally created Ōamaru Sings in September last year, and is about to embark on a 10-week community singing project called All Together Now.

“I want to get people who think they can't sing to sing, and research shows . . .  that it's as high as 85 percent of people have been told ‘don't sing, you can't sing’.

“So, basically, you know, a lot of the time people say, ‘Oh, you don't want me’, and I go, ‘um actually yeah, I do, you're the one that I want’ . . . and doing it in a way that's as unthreatening as it can be. No auditions, no need to read music, no need to have any understanding of musical stuff or what singing is about. Just simply, all I'm asking people to do is to attend the 10 weeks and be in the performance.

Sally and her partner Mark Townsend (That Food Guy) used to live in Auckland, where she set up a community choir in 2011 with the help of Auckland Creative Communities funding. That was also a 10-week programme with a concert at the end.

“At that stage I contracted a song leader from Auckland, 'cause I was new to it. So we fast forward to now and I'm not so new to it.”

Sally has been song leading for 10 years now, and also leads the Ōamaru Social Singing group, which is a non-performance group funded by Age Concern Otago.

She hopes the All Together Now project will be intergenerational, and attract all ages, from 15 to 80+. It begins on May 12 at the Scottish Hall, and will run every Sunday 3pm-5pm for 10 weeks. The final concert will be on Sunday, July 21.

The songs will vary from Zulu, to gospel, to traditional folk, and more, with guitar accompaniment provided by Rick Loos.

“I sing a line, singers repeat it back. A song is built incrementally like this and multiple harmony parts can be taught and learnt sequentially,” Sally says. 

Because the songs are learnt “by ear”, people do not need to read music. The only pre-requisite is they will need internet access for practising between sessions.

“That’s Mark's job, he's the tech guy. So he's setting up a website that we're in the throes of doing now, so we’ll have sound files for all the songs that we do.”

Also in the organising group is Rick’s wife Amanda Dennis, who will contribute her skills and experience in art, design, stage and backstage work.

Sally has managed to secure Creative Arts funding for the project, which is based on an uptake of 30 to 40 people. 

“If we get more than that, we'll deal with that and it will be great. We might just need to move the concert to a different venue from the Scottish Hall because we won't fit.

“We are going to get a group of whatever number it happens to be.”

Sally has a background working in health and wellness. She is a qualified psychiatric nurse, and also has experience in adult education, teaching at Wellpark College of Natural Therapies in Auckland in the area of mental wellness.

There are “lots and lots” of different benefits of group singing, she says.

“I believe that singing in a group has the power to enhance multiple and diverse aspects of individual and community wellbeing . . . I love how singing connects people and builds community,” she says.

Following the end of the 10 weeks, Sally expects more singing projects will eventuate, and perhaps different workshops for those who want to develop their singing.

“It’s a fairly organic process. We’ll see.”

Those who are interested in taking part in the All Together Now project are invited to contact Sally at [email protected] or by contacting Sally on 021 046 1022.