Reading Male Voice Choir launch Gwyn Arch Young Singers’ Competition 2024
Reading Male Voice Choir is repeating its competiiton to promote TALENTED YOUNG SINGERS.
The Gwyn Arch Young Singers’ Competition will take place on Saturday 9 March 2024 and will consist of three categories:
Junior (10-13 years)
Youth (14-16 years)
Young Adult (17-21 years)
The winner of each category will receive a financial award (£100, £200 and £300 respectively) and will be invited to perform at an All Winners' Concert with RMVC to be held in June 2024.
The Competition will be held at The Abbey School, Reading, on Saturday 9 March 2024.
The Competition is open to young singers of all genders between the ages of 11 and 21. Entrants can have their own accompanist, or RMVC an provide an accompanist for them on the day (with advance notice).
The closing date for entries is Wednesday 31 January 2024.
For further details of the Competition and entry arrangements please visit our website
About Reading Male Voice Choir
Reading Male Voice Choir (RMVC), one of the south of England’s premiere choirs, was established in autumn 1971 by our late musical director, Gwyn Arch MBE, with the aim of providing an opportunity for developing male choral singing and to provide entertainment for performers and audience. We are still going strong: we celebrated our 50th anniversary, and fifty years of singing, in 2022-23 (post-COVID lockdown).
Gwyn (who died in 2021, aged 90) was Director of Music at Bulmershe College of Higher Education. He was active in promoting choral singing in the Reading area for over 50 years, for all voices, and alongside RMVC he founded and ran the Bulmershe Girls’ Choir, South Chiltern Choral Society, and the Parenthesis Choir. His musical legacy in Reading is significant and touched many local people; and in 2006 he was awarded the MBE for services to music in Berkshire. We believe it merits ongoing recognition; and we hope you do, too.
Reading Male Voice Choir is particularly proud of its links with and support for the local community, particularly with young singers. To enhance this further the choir, as part of its 50th Anniversary celebrations, launched The Gwyn Arch Young Singers’ Competition, to identify, encourage and promote young singers. This was open to young singers, divided into three age groups between the ages of 11-21 years.
The inaugural Competition attracted a strong entry field of 23 young singers, all of whom were invited to perform for us in April 2023. The quality of entries was high, and Gwyn would have been proud. The three winners, one from each group, received a financial award and sang with the choir to a paying audience in a public concert in Reading in June 2023.
We were able to run and promote the 2023 Competition through the generous support of a number of local financial sponsors, who were acknowledged in the Concert programme. In the light of our successful first Concert, we have sufficient funds to repeat the Competition next year, 2024. After this we plan to run it as a regular, biennial, feature in the choir’s calendar activity, from 2026 onwards, as a proactive legacy for Gwyn and an active promotion for local young singers, subject to our ability to continue to attract financial sponsorship to support the ongoing event.
