Rock Choir leader Rachel Leitch has been singing for as long as she can remember.
But she hadn’t even started primary school when her family noticed that she had musical talent.
Love of The Little Mermaid
“I think it was a moment when I was in the living room when I was four and I was singing along to The Little Mermaid,” said the now 34-year-old from Perth.
“My mum clicked and couldn’t believe I’d managed to sing one of the songs, Part of Your World, from the film.
“I sang it beginning to end no bother at all.
“She thought ‘wow she can actually sing’, especially at that age.”
Rachel, a former pupil of Oakbank Primary and Perth High School, was into horses as a child.
She started dance classes and did some theatre work as well.
Aged eight, she performed in the Sound of Music at Perth Theatre and played the lead in The Innocence the following year.
But music was always her passion.
Pursuing a career in music
Leaving school at 16, she went to Perth College UHI and graduated with an honours degree in music performance.
Almost immediately after graduating, she got a job with Rock Choir.
Described as the UK’s original and award-winning, local, contemporary choir experience which now has 33,000 members country-wide, Rachel, who joined in 2011, helped establish a Rock Choir presence in central Scotland.
It’s been well documented that choir singing improves health and happiness, and this is at the heart of what the organisation does.
“I started up the choirs in Perth, Stirling and Dundee,” she said, “and now I do Perth, Stirling and Glenrothes.
“I’ve got two choirs in each location – that’s 480 people I see a week across all these choirs.
“My role is to teach and lead the choirs every week.
“Taking them through the repertoire that’s set by Rock Choir each term and arranging performances.
“We have social gatherings. We do some workshops.
“But it’s all based around obviously singing.
“It’s a massive thing on self-confidence and self-esteem, improving peoples’ wellbeing and their general health.
“So it’s not only the singing side of things, it can incorporate a whole lot of different things as well that’s positive to everybody – including me!”
What attracts people to Rock Choir?
Most of the people who join Rock Choir do so through word of mouth.
Facebook and social media has been a great tool when it comes to self-promotion.
People can also go on to their website and put in their postcode to identify their nearest choir.
From there they can book a free taster session to see if it’s for them.
One of the attractions is that there’s no audition and no requirement to read music.
The focus is on harmonies so no one is ever singled out.
People joining range from those who’ve had choir experience elsewhere to those who simply love to sing karaoke or to sing in the shower.
“If someone comes along to a choir session for the first time, I can have a chat with them when they arrive about where they feel they should sit in the choir depending on if they think they have a high voice, a middle voice or a low voice,” she said.
“Because it’s all in harmony.
“They just sit through the session and go with what I’m doing that day.
“They get to know people. I tend to buddy people up with someone else.
“Someone to chat to and make a friend with from the first session.
“After that I just have a chat with them, make sure they are all ok and email after the session.
“It’s up to them to decide if they’d like to commit to become a fully-fledged Rock Choir member.”
Variety of musical tastes
Sessions tend to cover a mixture of “feel-good pop, rock and contemporary chart songs”.
Performances take place throughout the year.
Sometimes they’ll be approached by charities to perform.
As a choir leader, Rachel try to keep 15 songs within their repertoire.
This ensures there’s enough material for their bigger gigs.
But there’s always scope for change as new artists come on the scene.
“We tend to try and keep what we call re-cap songs in,” she said.
“Things we’ve done a few years ago, sometimes we’ll still sing them in our set.
“But obviously the more that artists become more popular, we’ll bring them in.
“For example recently we’ve done a bit of Ed Sheeran.
“We wouldn’t have done him a few years ago. We try and keep up with the times.
“We are doing a Taylor Swift song this term.
“When The Greatest Showman movie came out, we now do This Is Me from that.
“The team at head office make arrangements for the songs.
“A favourite of mine with the choir is a song called A Thousand Years from The Twilight movies. Christina Perri is the original singer from it.”
Making it a family affair
Rachel says the benefits choir members get out of the experience tend to go hand-in-hand with what she gets out of it personally.
For the mother of two, it can sometimes be a family affair with Rachel’s mum Helen, aunt Janet and gran Jean taking part alongside her 12-year-old daughter Eilidh.
Her three-year-old daughter Aria is also showing an early interest in music – “singing before she was talking”.
Rachel also enjoys getting to know regular participants.
A big thing is helping people build their self-confidence and their self-esteem – improving their mental health and general health overall.
“Sometimes if you have a choir member that’s been there quite a long time, you get to know them a little better more personally,” she said.
“Sometimes they will offload things that have been happening in their lives – the reason why they joined the choir.
“A lot of the time unfortunately it can be because of a big bereavement in their life.
“Something major has happened.
“A big life event which has been very life changing, and they are looking for something to uplift them and know that singing has been proven to help that.
“They came along to choir and they stayed because that’s exactly what it does for them – it just lifts them. Lifts them up and lifts their spirits.
“I think a lot of people as well, when they come to choir, because you are really having to concentrate listening to the harmony parts and learning your part and putting it all together, they can leave whatever it is that’s bothering them at the door.
“They can come in and know for that 1.5 hours they can purely just focus on happiness and singing and then they can leave again.
“That’s a big part for them I think.”
Delighted to welcome Rock Choir founder
During the Covid-19 pandemic, Rock Choir continued sessions online with choir members either connected through Zoom or YouTube.
While numbers dropped slightly after the pandemic, interest is growing again.
Today there’s around 30,000 members in over 400 local communities UK-wide.
New choirs are getting set up all the time.
It was a “big thing” when Rock Choir creator and creative director, Caroline Redman Lusher, recently stopped by their session at St Mathews Church in Perth to see them as part of her tour visiting choirs around Scotland.
Caroline is an award winning singer and entrepreneur, known as the pioneer of the contemporary choir movement.
“I see Caroline more often than the choir members,” said Rachel.
“The choir leaders all meet three times a year down south usually in the Farnham/Birmingham area before each terms starts.
“But for the members, to actually have her there and be able to watch her teach, to let her hear their achievements of the songs that they have learned, being able to chat to her and ask her questions about how it started, that was amazing.”
Caroline herself said it was an “honour” to meet some of the ‘Scottish Rockies’ from Perth, Stirling and Glenrothes in person, especially after lockdown.
She said: “I was also told some highly emotional and heartfelt stories whilst I was with them.
“Members told me how Rock Choir had saved their lives, or given them the friendship and support when they needed it the most.
“It makes me incredibly proud of each and every one of them and also of talented Rock Choir leader Rachel Leitch, who work so hard to not only teach the Rock Choir song repertoire but to go above and beyond to nurture and support the members who take part.”
How to find out more
Rock Choir Perth, Stirling and Glenrothes are always keen to welcome new members. www.rockchoir.com
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