FAQs

We welcome singers of any and every gender. Our Treble Harmony Brigade is open to everyone who sings in the treble, or ladies’, range.

If you currently sing in the men’s range then you might like to consider:

• Men’s tenor – try lead, or bari if you’d prefer a harmony part. Or if you really have the high notes, ladies’ tenor tends to sit around G4-F5.
• Men’s lead – bass should be very comfortable, or bari/lead if you have some higher notes (a confident C5).
• Men’s bari – try bari if you have the higher notes, otherwise bass.
• Men’s bass – for ladies’ bass you will need to get up to G4 although much of the singing is done in D3-D4.

The only time we will ever ask you about gender is if you want us to find you another brigader to share a twin room.

No, brigades are completely separate from other barbershop organising groups. All experienced barbershoppers are welcome, as long as you are confident singing in a quartet. This is not an event for inexperienced singers.

A brigade has 12 songs of varying levels of difficulty. The music is sent out when you register so people registering early will have nearly 6 months to learn them.

You need to learn the songs fully so that you can sing them confidently in a quartet. We will give you lots of support, with a structured learning programme, chat support via Facebook and sing throughs running across the country and (hopefully) on Jamulus.

Everyone learns differently and only you can learn the songs – the real key is to start early and not leave it all till the last few weeks. Also don’t leave the tricky ones till last!

In UKTHB, the songs are split into two groups. The first 8 are silver-level songs, and everyone must learn them in order to come to brigade. The remaining 4 are gold-level songs, and people can choose to learn these as well. Many people set off aiming to do the silver songs and then “Went For Gold” and learned the gold songs too.

Whilst the selected songs will always be true to the barbershop style and typically be arranged by barbershop arrangers, UKTHB includes a wide range of song types, spanning songs from shows/musicals, popular music from various eras as well as some traditional barbershop songs thrown in for good measure!

Absolutely not, the whole point of these weekends is that you can come along on your own and sing with everyone. We will make sure there is a good balance of voice parts.

As you prepare for the event there will be local singthroughs so you can sing with more people in real life before the brigade itself.

Yes, we’d love to see you there! Please do make sure you still sing with everyone else at the weekend.

About half the songs are contestable but remember that the license we have only covers you to sing as part of our brigade. We will make details of the licensing sites available so that you can buy official quartet copies if you would like to.

We recognise that you might not be able to make the event itself but you might want to learn the songs, especially if any of your quartet or chorus buddies are attending.

We have a non-attending membership option giving you:

• Access to the music as a Harmony Brigade member (teach tracks and sheet music)
• Membership of the participants-only Facebook group
• Access to structured learning support (if desired)
• Information about and invites to sing-throughs
• Pre-event newsletters

Remember that you will all need to re-license the music in order to sing it formally with your quartet or chorus.

Finally, we work hard to keep a balance of voice parts on the Brigade weekend, so it is unlikely that you could convert this into an attending place later. Please register in the usual way if you would like to take up this option.

We’d love you to be in the hotel because this is really a residential weekend – singing starts before breakfast and goes on till the small hours. But we recognise that this may not be practical for everyone.

The non-residential price is listed on our registration page and includes dinners and a lunch.

We will aim to cover vegan/vegetarian diets and provide gluten and nut-free options. The hotel has a mixed kitchen so if you have any specific restrictions you should talk to them.

If you find that the hotel can’t support you then please let us know – we can work out a different price package for you this time, and we will also take it into account in future planning.

On the Thursday people tend to start arriving at the hotel around 5pm, and there will be an informal pub dinner at around 7pm which you pay for yourself. The singing starts as soon as four different parts assemble! On Friday there will be free-form singing all day, and we aim to organise some sing-outs too.

Thursday and Friday are a great opportunity to get a feel for how the songs work in real life if you haven’t been able to get to a sing-through, to build your confidence and improve your performance.

We hope so! We start working on these a few months before the event after we have an idea of interest and balance of parts.

Would you like to be part of the organising team? There is a link to email us behind the little envelope in the top left corner of the screen.

We hope so! What do you think would look good – pin badges, polo shirts, sparkly badges in the shape of our amazing logo?

Would you like to volunteer to be the merchandise organiser? There is a link to email us behind the little envelope in the top left corner of the screen.