Time to let loose with the air guitars

By WILLIAM DART

"At last," the press blurb says, "the much requested sequel to VVPops, our most popular concert ever. Down, metaphorically speaking, go our lutes and harps, our organs, violins and flutes, as once again we pick up our air guitars and oral saxophones, while the men practise their doo-be-doos and vocal drumbeats."

No, it's not a sequel to last weekend's Manhattan Transfer dates, but the final concert of Viva Voce's 2003 subscription series, Unplugged, a programme of pops from an a cappella choir that has been singing around our city for 18 years.

John Rosser, who founded the choir in 1985 and who is also chorus master and associate conductor for NBR New Zealand Opera, was bitten by the choral bug when he was a classics student. The turning point came when visiting English choralmeister Andrew Carter convinced him that "choral music could be about the audience having a good time as well as the singers".

It was a lead Rosser took to heart. Viva Voce would conceptualise most of their concerts around themes (this year has seen Stuff and Nonsense, Pieces of Eight and this week's Unplugged) along with trademark coloured shirts and inventive set-ups.

"Moving around between numbers means people aren't always looking at the same serried ranks of choristers which makes choirs look so military and patterned. We never stand in straight lines unless there's a humorous point to be made."

There are deeper preconceptions to be overcome. "For most people," Rosser muses, "choral music is a fairly arcane kind of thing. People perceive it as being churchlike and choirs as having to bask in a big bathtub acoustic, but this is not what I'm about."

The enviable range of Viva Voce's music can be heard on last year's Snapshots CD, which runs the gamut from Monteverdi to New Zealanders like Anthony Ritchie, whose As Long as Time is, according to Rosser, "one of the few sets of partsongs where a New Zealand composer has really captured the mood of each poem, from the jangling suburban neurosis edge of Cilla McQueen to the sheer nonsense of Sam Hunt".

Viva Voce have always looked after the local composer - on Sunday, you can hear Wayne Mason's Nature in an arrangement by Rosser's brother Mark.

Arranging a pop song for choral forces is always tricky. "Although it's got to be recognisable - after all that's why you're doing it - it also has to work for the choir. It can't be too bland and simple, but the singers mustn't sound geeky."

Apart from the Mason song, Viva Voce deliver standard international repertoire for Sunday's concert - "hippy rock from Hair, some bossa nova in Girl from Ipanema and a bit of beach rock with Barbara Ann, along with movement" is the first selection that Rosser offers.

Randy Newman fans can hear Short People in the King's Singers' arrangement alongside sentimental favourites like Reach Out and I'll Be There - although "not with the coke bit", Rosser adds.

Viva Voce have their own sound. Unlike some local choirs, put together by conductors who are "sticklers for fitting voices into the sound", Rosser feels that "blend is about the group of singers you've chosen. As long as they come in and off at the same time, phrase in the same way and sing with the same vowel colours, I don't think you should worry too much about hearing the odd voice here and there. After all, they are a group of individuals; I'm not into making them into a homogeneous same-sounding lot".

Performance

What: Viva Voce Unplugged

Where & when: Auckland Town Hall, Sunday 5pm