This is a public event being held by those involved in the Granton Castle Wallled Garden – a fantastic historic walled garden in Edinburgh which holds various events to connect the local community to the growing space and involve people in understanding more about gardening and the ecosystem and to actively particpate in growing…
Here’s a link to the friend’s website – it looks like they haven’t had time to post the wassail poster for this year!
Somehow the autumn has sped by, the weather has now turned good and chilly and we’re about to have our final meeting on 7th December prior to the holiday break. We’ve got a great session lined up with a further exploration of the marvellous Georgian Shen Khar Venakhi. Hopefully we will also be treated to a wee bit of home delicious home baking from Christine who has been generously supplying us a little something during our break for many a month.
Do come along to join us as we build the magical illusion of heat from the our centre piece fairy lights and the warmth of our harmonies!
We resume on Thursday 18th January 2024
There will be a singing event 2.30 – 3.30pm led by our song leader Penny Stone and open doors from 1.30 – 4pm. See the poster below 🙂
Having had a good summer break, including a fabulous outdoor get togther in July followed by nibbles and social in a member’s garden (when we were fortunately spared most of the summer rain, possibly due to our precautionary gazebo and event tent)…
We’re looking forward to starting back on 7th September at our venue on the corner of West Savile Terrace – check out our about page for more information!https://ocsg.org/about/
A highlight of the spring calendar was a wassailing event at Granton Castle Walled Garden on the 19th February – lots of people came along and a fun time was had. Hopefully the apple trees will bear particularly well this autumn as a result 🙂 A picture may follow – I need to check permissions!
Having taken a good couple of weeks off for Easter, we’re now well into the summer term. You can see a full list of what we sing each week on the latest songs page – “Deep down in my Soul” made a very popular re-appearance recently.
Our last session before the summer will be 29th June as we take a break for both July and August this year – we will resume on 7th Sept – so make sure to come along and fit in your signing before the summer break!
At the end of a successful autumn term, slightly saddened by the fact we’ve just had to cancel our final session tomorrow due to low temperatures and heating issues, we are looking forward to being able to Sing – in the New Year together. What better way to do this than with a special workshop session on 19th January?!
This will be an exciting start to the year and a great opportunity for people to try singing for the first time. It will also provide plenty of ways for more experienced singers to explore and experiment with their voices. New people are always welcome to come to our sessions, but this session should be particulary good for new folks who want to see if the way we do our singing is something that works well for them.
We won’t be meeting on 26th Jan 2023, but will be back to our normal routine of weekly singing sessions from 2nd February.
There may be a wassail event on a weekend around mid January… watch this space for updates!
We returned to singing on Thurs 8th September at Reid Memorial Church, West Savile Terrace, after a break for the Edinburgh festival. If you want a flavour of what we sing visit our Latest Songs page. If you want to understand our subs and more details on how it all works, please visit our About page. New members are welcome, our group is for all levels of singer and especially for those who have always wanted to sing, but maybe never felt quite confident, or were given a negative message about their singing abilities when young… We have fun and explore our vocal range and voice qualities without auditions or the need to read music, just metaphorically let your hair down and have fun 🙂
After an extended Easter break sessions are now back to two hours 6.30 to 8.30 on Thursday evenings in Reid Memorial Church.
During September we were delighted to be able to start meeting together to sing again in person by using a members garden locally in S. Edinburgh, however clearly with the shortening days and blustry autumnal weather getting more wintery this wasn’t really a sustainable situation… At present we are not able to return to the Eric Liddell Centre due to concerns around the adequacy of the ventilation for the risks of coronavirus transmission, so we are now meeting at Reid Memorial Church.
We are now well back into the swing of Thursday evening sessions running through until Easter with a half-term break on 13th February. Some of us joined the wassail at the Granton Walled Garden on a Sunday afternoon in January. creating good vibes for the orchard trees there (especially the apple ones) as well as for the willing band of volunteers working hard to bring the garden back to life. Do check out this Community Garden if you weren’t already aware of it.
Wednesday 4th December was one of our rare performances – our ‘gig’ at the switching on of the Christmas lights at the Eric Liddell Centre to support their work here in Edinbugh. There was a really good turnout- possibly the most we’ve ever had – and our singing (especially on the staircase inside) was much appreciated.
The other public activity that we sometimes engage in as a group is swelling the numbers at local Wassail events – for many years this has happened at community orchard’s in South Edinburgh, initially at the Royal Edinburgh Hospital and more recently at the Community garden by Gracemount House.
On Sunday 26th January 2020, there will be a Wassail Sing at Granton Walled Garden , an amazing garden which is being reclaimed by the local community . The OCSG song-leader, Penny, will be leading the singing and anyone can come along to join in. A Wassail is always a great event, when gratitude is sung to the trees for all their hard work, and and often involves a bonfire and hot apple juice . It’s a lovely thing to do on a dark Winter’s afternoon. Anyone in Edinburgh, particularly those local to Granton should take the opportunity to come along and discover the garden and singing!
We’re now on Christmas break, so not meeting 19th and 26th December or 2nd January, reconvening on 9th January 2020…
Many of us gathered on Middle Meadow Walk on Friday 20th September to join in the singing, led by Protest in Harmony, and support local school children running the Edinburgh Climate Strike event.
It all went off in a very orderly and positive fashion with much banging of drums and waving of banners with many a pithy message. It was a great experience to meet people from all areas and of all ages united in a common concern for the Climate emergency that we’re now in.  Whilst making our way down the Royal Mile and joining in chants, seeking to raise our voices together, we were heartened and cheers of applause went up as the bells were rung out at the Scottish Storytelling Centre in support of the marchers!
We’ll seek to continue to help in any way we can to try and bring about positive change and to persuade our government particularly to act with other governments in making meaningful changes and so try and secure a better future to enable people to adapt to the changes that are inevitably coming.
The singing group is now running through till just before Christmas with a break on the 17th October. On Wednesday 4th December we will be singing for the switching on of the Christmas lights at the Eric Liddell Centre. If you want to join in – try and get yourself along to some Thursday night sessions so you’ll know what we’re singing!
and are learning 6 songs being sung by a number of choirs at the Edinburgh Water-Aid event on 15th June in which some of us will be participants. We’ve also been covering some songs made famous by Pete Seager in anticipation of the Pete Seager Singathon organised by our song leader Penny Stone in celebration of the 100th anniversary of his birth.
Having started the year with a self-led session (which we are able to do now again when our song leader Penny Stone isn’t available) the Spring term is well underway running through to 4th April when we will have a two-week break for Easter and restart on 25th April. We’ve already tackled some new songs – we list the songs sung each week on the Latest Songs page where you can track back and see just how diverse a range we sing. One feature so far this year has been tackling the body percussion that accompanies Bring a Little Water, Silvy – Penny is helping us put it together very slowly but the challenge is well worth it giving the number another dimension. Because people can drop in at any time, Penny always recaps for those who are new or haven’t been for a while. To find out more details about the group do look at the About page.
We’re now on our mid-winter break, time for hunkering down and eating good food to put on an that healthy extra layer of fat to get us through the chill of winter…
Singing has been a heartening and encouraging experience in 2018 as new folks have joined us.  With lots of challenging times ahead, no doubt, in 2019 our signing group will keep finding new songs to share, as well as old favourites, to bolster our spirits and keep us in good company.  We look forward to creating interesting harmonies for whatever may come in the New Year!
We’re back into the swing of the Autumn term. We won’t meet on Thurs 18th Oct, but will meet all other Thursdays up to a date in December yet to be confirmed, possibly 13th Dec… On Wed 5th December we will have a short performance before the switching on of the Christmas Lights at the Eric Liddell Centre, followed by a few more songs inside the centre afterwards.
Newcomers welcome throughout the year – we learn by ear, so no need to read music to participate, just a willingness to explore your voice and have fun!
We’re now on our annual summer break – no meetings during August as Edinburgh becomes very hectic with the festival and fringe.
Singing resumes on Thursday 6th September…
We’ve had an interesting first few months to the year – an unusually wintery spell, being snowed off for the first time ever in our history, as Edinburgh ground to a halt in an exciting white out. Except for that we’ve met weekly 6.30pm every Thursday at the Eric Liddell Centre up to 29th March. Now we are on a two week break resuming 19th April, when hopefully the snow that has returned may have given way again to spring. The group enjoys songs from around the world, particularly those which build community spirit and support the development of more equal and participatory societies and so we not infrequently draw on the folk tradition of songs for human rights. Within this tradition the struggle against Apartheid is significant and July 18th 2018 will be the 100th anniversary of the birth of Rolihlahla Mandela in Mvezo S.Africa, maybe better known as Nelson Mandela. In the run up to this anniversary we will be covering some relevant songs, including a new composition specifically commissioned for the occasion – yes if you want to be involved in a World Premier, come and join us! All this in preparation for a celebratory event at Portobello beach set for Saturday 21st July to which all are cordially invited.
We’ve successfully kept ourselves warm through a chilly first couple of months to the year with a combination of Beatles love and folk harmonies from around the world. Our weekly singing continues right up to and including March 29th 2018, then we’ll have a two week break and recommence on Thursday 19th April 2018.  This year being the centenary of Nelson Mandela’s birth we’ll be doing a few more S. African songs in preparation for a celebratory event (still in the planning, so no date fixed as yet) to take place on Portobello beach. Possibly in May, details will be posted when available… As ever new singers are welcome to come and try us any week and it’s been a pleasure to welcome a number of new folk in 2018 as well as some old hands returning after various pauses – the latest songs page gives you an idea of what we sing each week.
Having had an enjoyable autumn term welcoming many newcomers who are now regular attenders we are looking forward to resuming on 11th January in the New Year. In our final Penny led session of this term as well as learning some final parts of “I’m Gonna do it all” we had a wee practice with one of our wassail songs to begin preparation for the wassail scheduled for Sat 20th January at Gracemount Community Garden. Here’s a link to the event: https://www.facebook.com/events/1550244865071628/ If you’d like to try singing come along and join us any Thurs evening from 11th Jan!
It’s been lovely to welcome many new people to the group during September who have injected energy, joy and more voices to build our harmonies. Please feel free to come along and try us any Thursday evening with our taster fee and we hope you’ll be inspired to continue to explore finding your voice.  It’s great to build our regular attender membership and increase the richness of our harmonies with a variety of voices and experiences. Please note that we will NOT be meeting on Thurs 19th October as we are taking a short mid-term break :o)
We’ve been enjoying our singing right up to 27th July, but as usual take a break during August – too many other things to do with the festival going on. Come along and try out the fun and pleasure of singing and experimenting with all sorts of voice and different folk traditions from around the world any Thursday evening from 7th September 2017 which is when we re-start.  We welcome newcomers and all “I can’t Singer’s”! The great joy is you’ll discover you can :o)
We’ve started our Spring term with some great sessions – including a self-led one when Penny was off enjoying herself on a musical break. That gave some of the more confident amongst us the opportunity to teach us some of their own songs and get a flavour of the joys and pitfalls of leading! We’ve learnt a new round in German from one of our number and re-visited the improbable, but delightful, experience of singing three different songs simultaneously (Swing low sweet chariot, When the saints and I wanna sing). A group of us were also able to join Penny in supporting the community Wassail event at Gracemount House Community Garden on 21st January – part of an all day community event to help develop the community resource at Gracemount House. Why not come along to try out singing and join in the fun!
Thursday 15th Dec is our last meeting before Christmas and the New Year. We’ve had a busy term and are building up to recording a few of our favourite songs so that folks visiting will have a better feel of the kind of singing we do together – and of course will be encouraged to come along and join in!
Our first effort may well be a rendition of “Era Nato Poveretto” brought to us by an Italian member who has since returned to Italy and is apparently looking forward to us sending our recording so she can share it with her Italian singing group 🙂
We resume in the New Year on Thurs 12th January 2017 and look forward to welcoming new members – especially folks interested in the wassail tradition as we’ll be participating in wassails at community orchards in January.
We’re back singing together every Thursday except 20th OCT – when we’re NOT MEETING, then we expect to continue until whenever we get around to breaking for Christmas. We had a great first session last week with a number of new songs, lots of fun messing around with “Rhythm & Syncopation” and a pretty decent effort at Barbara Ann, despite over half of us wanting the luxury of singing the tune, the backing singers did very well to hold their own! No doubt lots more exciting new songs to be experimented with through the Autumn and maybe some harmony jamming sessions too…
We’ve had a full spring and summer, finally performing California Dreaming at the Eric Liddell Centre Spring Fling, now with midsummer and the festival rapidly approaching we will be having our final singing session at the Eric Liddell Centre before our summer break on Thurs 14 July 2016 and resuming on Thurs 8th September 2016. For the last two weeks in July we will join the Sangstream summer drop in workshops across the road at Christ Church Hall, 7-9pm, see here for latest info: http://sangstream.org.uk/summer-singing-workshops/
To see a list of songs we’ve covered during this year so far, check out our latest songs page where we note each week’s songs.
Our weekly singing resumes on Thursday 14th January and we will be joining with the community in Gracemount this Saturday 16th Jan with a wassail event at the Gracemount Mansion Community Centre EH16 6FD where there is a fabulous walled garden and we can see how well the apple trees have done since our wassail to them last year. Event poster here
We had a full and busy time before Christmas, joining in with Protest in Harmony to sing at the Edinburgh Climate March in support of the climate conference in Paris and also performing a Yoik in support of indigenous peoples on Portobello beach on Sunday 6th Dec 2015 – link to video here!
Our last singing session for will be Thursday 17th December and our first of 2016 will the Thurs 14th January. Recent highlights of the autumn term have included participating in the Climate March of 28th Nov and we anticipate contributing to a Yoik in solidarity with indigenous peoples around the world threatened by climate change to take place Sun 6th Dec on Portobello beach – a link to youtube video may follow!
It’s time to join together and sing again :o)  The fringe and festival are past and the first touches of Autumn are in the trees. It was lovely to have a number of new faces joining us in our first week back on 3rd Sept, so if you’re hesitating about coming and wondering if you’ll be the only new one, have no fear, you won’t be alone and any anxieties should soon drop away as you relax and begin to enjoy playing with sound and making noises with us!
With random ridiculously heavy rain clouds it’s clearly July in Edinburgh and building up to a really wet welcome for all the festival visitors. So we’ll be taking a break from singing during August to allow more time for exploring the fringe or escaping the town hustle and bustle. Have fun, collect new music and song experiences and remember to bring them along to share with the group when we start up again on 3rd September 2015.
As the apples and cherries are blossoming and the birds are chirping, we continue our weekly singing sessions on Thursday evenings at 6.30pm. We regularly add new songs to our repertoire and you can get a flavour of the range of material we sing on our “Latest Songs” page. We’re taking a one week break on 21st May 2015 and planning an outdoor session possibly in June – details will be posted. Do come along and join us at any session, we welcome new participants – learning to sing together is a joyful and uplifting experience 🙂
We’re continuing to meet weekly at 6.30pm in the Eric Liddell Centre until sometime in December – the exact date yet to be specified… Many of us joined with Protest in Harmony to sing at the People’s Climate March on Sunday 21st September – I think it was a first experience of marching and singing in public for many of us and it was a very enjoyable experience. There was a lovely atmosphere with lots of folk joining in with us as interested bystanders and enjoying it, so I’m hoping that some of them may make it along to join us at the weekly sessions in the near future.
We’re missing Fergus’ contributions at the moment – he’s so good at getting us started on the walk-around harmonies and is particularly good at the ape warm up, so we trust he’ll return to aping around with us soon.
Open Community Singing Group Edinburgh - a community choir for all 