FRON MALE VOICE CHOIR

Voices of the Valley

Even if the Welsh village of Froncysyllte hadn't become known for its award-winning male voice choir, it could still boast many alluring qualities. Perched on the side of the Berwyn Mountains above the Vale of Llangollen, Fron (as even Welsh-speakers end up calling it, rather than risking its full pronunciation of "vron-cuss-ulth tay") is a picturesque cluster of tidily-kept cottages and gardens, but also a prime historic site. It was here that the engineer Thomas Telford built his celebrated aqueduct at the beginning of the 19th century to carry the Llangollen canal across the Dee valley. And to the south of the village runs Offa's Dyke, erected by the Anglo-Saxon king Offa to keep the mutinous Welsh penned in on their side of the border.

The locals are understandably proud of their village (whose name means "meeting place on the side of the hill"), and need little urging to give visitors a guided tour of the local landmarks. Amid ravishing mountain views, the ruined Castell Dinas Bran peers down from its own hilltop, overlooking Llangollen and its Eistedffod auditorium where the choir won yet another choral competition earlier this year. They'll have even more to celebrate in 2007 when the choir reaches its 60th anniversary, an event for which the ensemble's debut album for UCJ makes the perfect introduction.

Voices Of The Valley is a rousing collection of top tunes ancient and modern, from hymns such as Abide With Me or Guide Me O Thou Great Redeemer to folk songs (Danny Boy, Shenandoah) to pop classics, including Unchained Melody and a daring new arrangement of Sailing. The choir relies on the stirring power of its 60 male voices to squeeze every drop of emotion from the songs.

The Fron first came to the attention of UCJ after Daniel Glatman, manager of boy band Blue, happened to hear them singing at a wedding. "There I was at a wedding when the choir started to sing against the backdrop of this stunning scenery. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up and when that happens, you can't ignore it. We simply had to capture that passion on record and thankfully the chaps at UCJ agreed. The next thing I knew, I was negotiating a major record deal for a group of part time amateur singers from a Welsh Valley. It's a great story."

"He thought 'these guys could do something'," recalls Alan Smith, a retired accountant and now the choir's treasurer. "He liked what he heard and he pursued it, and the record company came down to hear us." "It's been a great adventure, but it's been very hard work," adds Dave Jones, the choir's chairman.

Awesome as the Fron can sound when it's thundering along at full tilt, the choir isn't a professional organisation. The members are either retired or hold down day jobs to make a living, and the choir has to raise its own funds to pay for overseas trips. It relies on support from the redoubtable wives, mothers and girlfriends of the Ladies Committee who are adept at running Quiz Nights, sponsored walks and garden parties to help fill the coffers. It's part of the Fron's identity that it remains rooted in its home soil, and it's proud of its role as part of the social glue that helps to bind the community together. Dennis Williams, now in his seventies but still singing with the choir he joined the day it began, explains that "we take people on and we try our best to see if they've got a voice. I think that's a lovely attitude to be committed to, because nobody is barred. If you can pick and choose your voices OK, you might do that much better, but we're a community choir."

The Fron was founded in 1947, as a gesture of healing and rebuilding in a world still smouldering in the aftermath of World War Two. Froncysyllte had always enjoyed a healthy tradition of choral singing, but the choir's formation was inspired by the idealistic ambition of helping to build a more harmonious world by joining other competing nations at Llangollen's newly-founded International Musical Eisteddfod. Following a public meeting in the village, singers were recruited from local chapels and the Youth Club Choir. The choir won its first prize in 1950, taking top honours at the Flint Eisteddfod, and in the ensuing decades has undertaken numerous international tours and carried home a van-load of trophies. Apart from a string of victories at Llangollen, they've won first prize at the Malta International Choir Festival, the Harmonie Festival at Limburg in Germany, the North Wales Choral Festival, the Huddersfield Choral Festival and the British Steel National Championships.

Line up a few beers, and the boys will start reeling off yarns about their adventures. There was the time they won first prize in a singing competion in Athens, singing The Greek Fisherman in Greek. "But what spoiled it was, as we walked off one of our choristers dropped dead," says Dennis. "It was so sad, because he was a great chap." "I suppose you could say he died happy," adds Alan Smith. "We'd just been told we won, and that's when he keeled over." Dennis scratches his head. "There was another guy we left behind in Vancouver with a heart attack, and we left another one in San Sebastian with a nervous breakdown."
There's a surge of collective pride when they remember sharing a stage with a rather snooty choir from Maastricht. "They were very aloof," remembers Dave Jones, "and they sang well but they all sang from sheet music. Then we sang our programme, and you could see they were gripped. Their conductor stood up afterwards and said to his lads 'you see those boys. None of them had sheet music, and they sang from the heart. If I could get you to do that then I'd be really happy'. And that was one of the best choirs in Holland!"

Yet for all their success, they recognise that they're part of a choral tradition that risks dying out if efforts aren't made to preserve it. Historically, several factors have contributed to the great Welsh singing tradition, and most of them are disappearing, not least the Welsh language which seems to contain its own in-built musicality. As the choir's conductor and music director Ann Atkinson explains, "when you think back, in all the places where men gathered to work, like quarries or mines, singing was such a strong part of their lives. Somewhere like Blaenau Ffestiniog or Bethesda where they had the quarries, or the mines in South Wales. But the mines and quarries have closed down now." "I think something about mining and singing goes together," adds Alan Smith. "Maybe singing expels the coal dust from the lungs." "I think it was escapism," adds Dennis Williams,"to get away from the terrible jobs they had down the mines."

Again, the Welsh chapel tradition could once be relied upon to provide a solid backbone of singers, but that's been under threat too. "You don't get much singing in schools now," says Ann Atkinson, "and you've lost the chapel element as well. People used to go to Sunday school chapel and they would learn tonic sol-fa, do-re-mi-fa-so and all that. But that's gone." But the Fron are determined to carry on and keep raising their game. Their 60th anniversary diary for 2007 is filling up fast, and includes a concert with harpist Catrin Finch on St David's Day in March, the Llangollen Eisteddfod in July and a tour to Cyprus in the autumn. "A lot of Welsh choirs don't compete any more, but we love going somewhere and trying to win the prize," says Alan Smith. "Competing gives you a buzz and makes you learn new pieces. It keeps your standards up."