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Age of Majority singers wants to thank everyone for checking out our virtual concert, Branches, on December 11th. The night was filled with music, reflection, and conversation. For anyone who missed it, check it out on YouTube below!
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 Age of Majority Singers invites you to join us for an evening of music and dialogue around themes of allyship, racial justice and awakening to action.
The program includes excerpts from a panel discussion with Kevin Ramessar, and Jon Corbin, as well as songs and video. Age of Majority Singers is a community choir based in Kitchener-Waterloo, whose mission is to foster a diverse community in which young people can share their love of music. Kevin Ramessar is a multi-instrumentalist, teacher, composer, and conductor whose Broadway credits include Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, To Kill A Mockingbird, Jesus Christ Superstar, and Dear Evan Hansen. Having spent the last 20 years touring internationally, Kevin finds joy in vibrant musical collaborations, and is deeply committed to anti-colonial, anti-racist practices and cultivating more equitable, just, and inclusive communities. You can find out more at kevinramessar.com. Jon Corbin is a Canadian hip-hop artist, spoken word poet, speaker, band leader, writer and DJ based in Milton, ON. He is also a high school teacher and father of five children with his wife, Abigail. Since 2001, first under the name The Runaway, Jon has blessed stages big and small with lyrical themes of faith, love, family, social justice, and personal growth. You can find out more at joncorbinmusic.com. If you would like to support the choir financially, you may make a donation via your ticket registration by entering a value in the 'donation' box as part of your registration, otherwise, you may support us by clicking here.  On October 12th, 2021, AOMS was honoured to be able to spend time at O:se Kenhionhata:tie (Land Back Camp) in Waterloo, Ontario for a night of singing and sharing stories around a fire.
We extend our thanks to the members of the camp for allowing us to spend time in their sacred space, sharing in music together. Our singers learned the pronunciation of the Mohawk word that is the name of the camp. O:se Kenhionhata:tie means 'Willow River' and is what the Grand River was called by the indigenous peoples who lived on and around it's banks until the French settlers arrived and changed the name. It is pronounced "O-see Gon-Yun-Hah-Dah-Jee" On December 16th, 2020, Board Member, Eric Jackson & Artistic Director, Megan Brenneman spoke with Mike Farwell on 570 News to discuss how AOMS has navigated through this new virtual choir setting and provided a brief overview on our upcoming virtual choir season! Click the link below to listen to our segment (scroll ahead to 62min 30sec in the audio).
“I heard a bird sing in the dark of December. A magical thing. And sweet to remember. We are nearer to Spring than we were in September. I heard a bird sing in the dark of December.” ― Oliver Herford
December is upon us, and with it, the final turn of the year, towards the possibilities of 2021, and, most importantly for me, towards the returning warmth.
Usually, this time of the year is filled with the plans of holiday celebrations with family and friends. This year, many of those plans will shift and change, towards virtual gatherings hosted on many different platforms and with many different configurations. Age of Majority Singers wishes all of our members, their families and their friends a warm, safe and love-filled holiday season. We extend our thanks to our members for their commitment and patience during this tumultuous year, and our appreciation for their dedication to continuing to sing, together but apart. With this in mind, we are excited to state that our first virtual choir season will be ready to launch in the New Year! We encourage you to invite your friends, family and neighbours, to sing with us, in their homes, as our Artistic Director will lead the group through some warm ups, vocal exercises and raising our voices in song, even though we remain apart. In order to help us facilitate these voice building sessions, we will be asking participants to provide a small fee for us to be able to provide the platform and technology to bring our sessions to life. If you are unable to join us for the season, but still wish to give, or have folks in your network who are hoping to help an arts organization remain resilient, they can help by donating here. May this season be both merry and bright, and may the new year be full of joyful noise. - Jessica Flood, AOMS Secretary 
A Note From our Artistic Director, Megan
“Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind?”
The traditional song heard around the world on New Year’s Eve, “Auld Lang Syne”, reminds me of the important role that casual acquaintances have in my life. During the pandemic, many of us have been deprived of our ‘weak-tie’ friendships, like those we may experience in choir. This BBC article describes how our interactions with casual acquaintances can bring us new information, new opportunities, spark creativity, and give us a greater sense of happiness and belonging. Choir is not the same when it’s online, that’s for sure, but AOMS is making an effort to stay connected in this way so that people can still maintain a sense of belonging and share their joy of making music, albeit a different way of doing so. As the holiday season and the new year approaches, let’s “take a cup o’ kindness yet” and raise it to our health, happiness, and to each other - our old choir acquaintances. Whether we encounter each other intentionally in virtual singing opportunities, or by chance in the community, I look forward to the next time I’m fortunate enough to see you again. Sending love and light to you all.
Take a moment to learn some more about the Ojibwe' People's history, outside of what we are able to cover in our AOMS sessions in the video above.
 'Our twilight month November is, the evening of the year' - Ruby Archer, 'November' We're drawing closer now to the end of this year; the cold setting in and the days shortening. It's been a year of challenges for many; personal, political, medical, environmental. Age of Majority Singers has faced our own challenges as well, organizationally. We started this year with big plans for Branches in the spring, and for further work in this fall semester, but circumstances beyond our control have shaped this year in ways none of us could see coming. Not being able to sing together has been challenging as a community of choral singers, and your board has been working hard to come up with ways to hold the feeling of community close even if we cannot yet share space with each other. This past week, we had our first virtual voice-building session, over Zoom, and it was deeply moving to watch people's faces as we sang, together but apart, safe in the confines of our own homes but voices raised in unison towards the goal of making music together. We have a second virtual session planned for the evening of December 2nd, please sign up to join us and invite a friend, the more the merrier. - Jessica Flood, AOMS Secretary  A Note from Our AOMS Artistic Director Megan Brenneman Seeing the new and familiar, smiling faces joining us for our first Voice-Building Session this week, reinforced the idea that singing together - even in these strange times, and even while muted online - still has the power to build a sense of community and to bring comfort and healing. A friend recently shared this NY Times article with me, which speaks to this very concept. Age of Majority Singers is doing what we can to “keep the light on” for our pre-existing community, and those who are seeking that connection through music. Enjoy this video of vocal music and spoken poetry from a group of like-minded artists in the Netherlands who are also sending this message - “We are here, waiting for our cue...finding new ways, we push through…” I hope you will join us to “keep the light on” and share the light with others! Support one of our own AOMS family members! Graeme and his band have recently launched the above song. Check them out on social media and share your love!   We are happy to present our first AOMS newsletter! This will be the launch of our monthly newsletter which will bring you the latest news in music, and some updates regarding our community. If you ever have any suggestions or updates to share with our group, please do not hesitate to reach out to our executive team with suggestions. For the month of October, please read on for information about our scheduled virtual voice building session, reflections from Megan, and some music to enjoy while we are trapped at home during these hard times. We are pleased to be offering a free / pay-what-you-can virtual voice building session on October 29th. Please register and share with friends! Check out the orange registration link below for more details. Register For Our Voice-Building Session Autumn Reflections Megan Brenneman, AOMS Artistic Director While I relish the warmth of long summer days and recreation in the sun, there is something about autumn that I find equally agreeable. Maybe it’s the harvest of fresh produce, the satisfying crunch of the first bite into a freshly picked apple, the vibrant colours of leaves turning, the laughter of my children as they jump into large piles of fallen leaves. Perhaps it’s the memories...of making cider with the old cider press at my grandparents’ farm and of family gatherings at Thanksgiving weekend. These comforting associations also come with the realization of autumn as a time of transition. Trees put on that vibrant display of colour and inspiration just before they release those leaves from their branches to the earth below. It is their natural response to the colder temperatures. The process of shedding leaves helps trees to conserve water and reabsorb important nutrients into their roots for their survival. For Age of Majority Singers, this autumn, and indeed since last spring, we have been thrust into a time of transition with the advent of a global pandemic. We are in a completely new kind of ‘season’ where our old structures and routines do not work for the time being. We cannot safely gather in person to sing together at the moment, so we are in a season of ‘shedding’ many of our former practices. While this is difficult and painful, it also gives us the opportunity to reflect on who we are as an organization, how we can still serve our singing community, fulfill our commitments, and think about who we want to become. We recognize that to survive as a non-profit arts organization will require creativity and resourcefulness - a release of the old leaves in order to conserve the energy required to weather the next season. This is why we are in the midst of re-imagining new ways of coming together to sing through technological means. With renewed perspectives, we are rebuilding our ‘Branches’ project that was to be presented last spring. We are renewing our efforts to seek funding through sponsorships and applying for grants to sustain the organization. We are unlearning and relearning about what it means to be anti-racist in our organizational and artistic practice. We are asking, how do we embrace a life-sustaining way to make choral art? A way that enables everyone to be seen, known, and celebrated? A way that is not afraid of making mistakes, but is willing to learn from them? We know that this pandemic ‘season’ will not last forever, and the singing will be that much sweeter when we can gather in-person. While we wait for that time to come, let’s find a new way forward. I hope that you will join us on this journey of growing and becoming. You are all invited. Autumn Reflections Megan Brenneman, AOMS Artistic Director While I relish the warmth of long summer days and recreation in the sun, there is something about autumn that I find equally agreeable. Maybe it’s the harvest of fresh produce, the satisfying crunch of the first bite into a freshly picked apple, the vibrant colours of leaves turning, the laughter of my children as they jump into large piles of fallen leaves. Perhaps it’s the memories...of making cider with the old cider press at my grandparents’ farm and of family gatherings at Thanksgiving weekend. These comforting associations also come with the realization of autumn as a time of transition. Trees put on that vibrant display of colour and inspiration just before they release those leaves from their branches to the earth below. It is their natural response to the colder temperatures. The process of shedding leaves helps trees to conserve water and reabsorb important nutrients into their roots for their survival. For Age of Majority Singers, this autumn, and indeed since last spring, we have been thrust into a time of transition with the advent of a global pandemic. We are in a completely new kind of ‘season’ where our old structures and routines do not work for the time being. We cannot safely gather in person to sing together at the moment, so we are in a season of ‘shedding’ many of our former practices. While this is difficult and painful, it also gives us the opportunity to reflect on who we are as an organization, how we can still serve our singing community, fulfill our commitments, and think about who we want to become. We recognize that to survive as a non-profit arts organization will require creativity and resourcefulness - a release of the old leaves in order to conserve the energy required to weather the next season. This is why we are in the midst of re-imagining new ways of coming together to sing through technological means. With renewed perspectives, we are rebuilding our ‘Branches’ project that was to be presented last spring. We are renewing our efforts to seek funding through sponsorships and applying for grants to sustain the organization. We are unlearning and relearning about what it means to be anti-racist in our organizational and artistic practice. We are asking, how do we embrace a life-sustaining way to make choral art? A way that enables everyone to be seen, known, and celebrated? A way that is not afraid of making mistakes, but is willing to learn from them? We know that this pandemic ‘season’ will not last forever, and the singing will be that much sweeter when we can gather in-person. While we wait for that time to come, let’s find a new way forward. I hope that you will join us on this journey of growing and becoming. You are all invited. Copyright © 2020 Age of Majority Singers, All rights reserved. We are a community choir devoted to creating a welcoming and accessible space for young adults to find and share their joy of music As we adjust to a virtual environment, Age of Majority Singers is hosting some online voice-building sessions. Connect with us as we explore vocal techniques to keep our voices in shape until we can all sing together again in person! This event is open to current & past choir members, as well as those in our community who would like to just give their voices a workout and consider connecting with us to join the choir when we resume in-person rehearsals in the future! To help support the choir, this event is a pay-as-you-can. We encourage all to participate regardless of what you can contribute. Register for this virtual session now!  Photo by Peter Crosby, Pexels.
Since the COVID-19 pandemic shut down in-person rehearsals in March 2020, AOMS has been busy putting together a virtual version of one of the songs intended for our spring concert. Enjoy our version of 'Love is Love'.
Due to the situation with COVID-19, we have made the unfortunate decision to cancel our spring concert. This was a challenging decision to make but we ultimately feel it is the right decision for our community. Thank you for your ongoing support and we look forward to singing for you again!
We gratefully acknowledge the financial support of the Region of Waterloo Arts Fund, which has allowed us to premiere a new choral arrangement by local guitarist and vocalist, Kevin Ramessar. We are so pleased that Kevin and his daughter Keziah will be joining us as special guests. The program also includes songs from various eras and perspectives, composed or arranged for choir, that ask questions about what it means to be an ally. We reflect on the courageous activism of those who came before us, and ponder how to continue this legacy of hope for a more equitable society. Date: Sunday April 26, 2020 Time: 4:00 PM Place: St. Matthews Lutheran Church, 54 Benton Street, Kitchener ON Parking: Across the street at the Charles and Benton Parking Garage.
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