Location
Staffordshire
Staffordshire
Community choirs; Singing for Lung Health, Singing for Wellbeing workshops; Stoke Sings Festival
Kate Barfield is a maker, musician, singer and sings and plays fiddle and trombone with the Boat Band and has been leading singing workshops and choirs since 2003.
Singing Groups
Kate leads community choirs in Staffordshire: Loud Mouth Women, and together with Greg Stephens: Clay Chorus, The Mystery Singers and Village Voices Singing for Lung Health Group. Kate trained in Singing for Lung Health with the British Lung Foundation (now Asthma and Lung UK) and The Musical Breath. Village Voices has been online since Covid.
Singing for Theatre
Kate and Greg work in alternative/community/site specific theatre and they incorporate the choirs in the productions such as the Mystery Plays and most recently Animal Apocalypse. They have involved the choirs on other theatre productions where they have provided the music for Dark Side of the Moon with Greenhouse Theatre and Beautiful Thing with Tobacco Factory Theatre. Kate has worked as a musician, maker and performer with theatre groups including: B Arts, Dog Troep, Welfare State International, Action Transport, Charivari, Action Space Mobile, Emergency Exit Arts.
Singing workshops
Kate has led many singing workshops and singing sessions for diverse groups in different settings including: teenagers; LGBT groups; singing sessions in schools; a prison; a women`s refuge (Raise the Roof) and Wellbeing at Work sessions. Kate and Greg have created a community choir at Party Neuf Festival and have lead Singing Walks and Singing for Wellbeing in Woods.
Work with refugee singers
Kate and Greg have sung with refugees, encouraging them to sing and record their songs and gone into schools with them to sing and talk with the children about the refugee experience.
Stoke Sings ! Community Choirs Festival
Kate and Greg are part of Stoke Sings which has put on Stoke Sings ! Community Choirs Festival, (a 400 strong choir festival) for two years in Stoke on Trent as well as many other singing activities.
Clay Chorus is a mixed gender community choir based in Penkhull. It’s led by Kate Barfield and Greg Stephens of the Boat Band.
Clay Chorus were formed in 2006 in order to sing in a B.arts community theatre show: Clay, and have sung in many shows since including the Penkhull Mystery Plays, outside on Penkhull village green, and as part of Beautiful Thing at the New Vic Theatre. They have also sung in their own shows: “Titanic Echoes” and ” Floating on Brindley`s Dreams”, and most recently for Animal Apocalypse, a show about the plight of the natural world.
Clay Chorus welcomes all voices. There’s no need to read music as we learn the songs by ear and repetition.
Monday evenings in term time from 7.30pm-9.00pm (from 7.45pm on second Monday of the month)
Loud Mouth Women is a friendly , welcoming community choir based in Clayton, Newcastle Under Lyme. There`s no need to read music as we learn the songs by ear and repetition. We sing songs from around the world in different languages.
Tuesday evenings in term time, from 7.30pm- 9.00pm
