Westcoast Harmony Chorus

Westcoast is still riding high from our 6th-place finish at International in Phoenix, and our excitement has paid off with an almost unprecedented influx of new members.

Some of these wonderful newbies came to us through an open invitation to join us in a series of Christmas performances in Surrey and Langley. They picked up our unusual arrangements of old Christmas favourites, rehearsed with us, and braved the elements to sing outdoors at the Surrey Tree Lighting Festival and “indoors” amid drips from a leaky tent at Christmas Glow Langley. And then they stayed, along with more who found us in the New Year. We are so fortunate!

Valentine’s Day saw us bring back one of our favourite roaming fundraisers, Valentine-O-Grams, for the first time since the pandemic. Five quartets spent the day and evening driving around BC’s Lower Mainland to sing the love song “You Make Me Feel So Young” to lucky recipients—in homes, residences, schools, workplaces, restaurants, parking lots, you name it. It was a crisp clear day with no snow on the roads, a perfect opportunity to appreciate this gorgeous place we live in while serenading loved ones.

And now we’re in the run-up to Regional 2023 in Saskatoon! We’ll soon be spending a weekend with our renowned coaches, Ryan Heller, director of Alamo Metro Chorus in San Antonio, TX, and Erin Howden, director of North Metro Chorus in Toronto. Our own director, Anne Downton, is holding our feet to the fire (she’s so good at that!), making sure we continue to improve while never losing focus of who we are now—a Top Ten International chorus offering a welcoming place for diverse singers to join us in this unique art form.