A CHRISTMAS concert showcased the impressive achievements of a crowd-to-choir eight-week project run by the Crown Church, Hillingdon, last Sunday.

After the success of Gareth Malone’s The Choir on BBC 2, community choirs have popped up across the country.

Dan Smith, associate pastor at Crown Church, went to the same school as Gareth and shared a music teacher.

“We share Gareth’s passion for helping people to find their place in a supportive community,” he said.

“He’s has done an amazing thing in pioneering the power of the choir and championing the value of genuine community. The success of his projects and the vision of the BBC to put them on TV will have inspired many people to try something similar.”

More than 50 people took part in the project, with a huge age range from 16 to over 60.

Lawyers, jobseekers and students came together and, led by choirmaster Femi Anifalaje, put on a professional performance.

Femi began rehearsals in October.

“Walking into a room full of strangers is a daunting thing,” said Dan. “You could feel everyone’s nerves at the start.”

The group was encouraged to record rehearsals on their phones, to help them practise.

Singing in choirs has long been enjoyed socially and is known to lift your spirits.

Recent reports take this one step further and suggest singing can aid health problems, including memory loss.

The Alzheimer’s Society runs Singing for the Brain.

Chreanne Montgomery-Smith, of AS, helped devise Singing for the Brain sessions in 2003 after noticing how some people with dementia responded to singing.

Chreanne had been running song quizzes in a nursing home and noticed how people’s memories reacted differently to music, as though it accessed a different part of the brain.

One lady sang so much she learned every song in the quiz, and remembered and sang them all. She was somebody who didn’t know her own name.

The NHS also began a pioneering project in January at the Chelsea and Westminster maternity unit, to provide emotional and physical benefits for women and their babies during pregnancy.

Dan Smith said: “As a health promotion and illness prevention method, I think it’s right up there with going for a jog and laughing.”

Sunday’s concert raised money for HillingdonMind, a mental health charity.

“It’s been a massively positive project,” said Dan. “Not only did we give a lot of people something to cherish as a Christmas memory, but the project as a whole gave a lot of people a valuable sense of occupation, achievement and belonging.”