The Superhero Show – Brighton Gay Men’s Chorus

Is every city in the UK as blessed with great community choirs as Brighton & Hove. This time I am writing about Brighton Gay Men’s Chorus with their Fringe Festival offering for 2017, The Superhero Show. The choir is very good indeed, well drilled by their musical director and offering a good mixed programme these days that includes contemporary and classic pop as well as an excellent rendering of The Slaves Chorus from Beethoven’s Fidelio. They also serve up some excellent solos, this time a lovely version of Mariah Carey’s Hero from Sadao Ueda in the first half and in the second half a moving rendition of Neverland from the fine voice of Chris Baker. They do sketches too, some very funny and others less successful, I’m not sure they are necessary but that’s just me.

The Superhero theme was certainly stressed in the second half where, after the interval, the entire choir returned in superhero fancy dress and in addition they added choreography, or is this armography, to the performance. It lifted the entire evening a notch higher as the whole became far more than just a concert and became a fully rounded entertainment.

Speeches at the end did have a feel of school assembly, but it was good to hear how fund raising efforts have helped secure the future of the Sussex Beacon and in particular praise for Adam Betteridge whose amazing work raising both awareness and money have surely made him a real superhero. The BMGC certainly know how to put on a show!

5 May

St George’s Church

Andrew Kay

5 stars