The audience in an upstairs room of Northampton Central Library thought they were going to spend Sunday afternoon listening to the debut gig of the Northampton Complaints Choir.
But choirmaster Joseph Kohlmaier has a surprise. The audience are going to be the choir. They will join with those of us who have been rehearsing a libretto for a song cycle created over research workshops during the weekend. “We have a-choired you,” says the twinkly eyed Austrian director of MusArc, an experimental choir collective invited to the town as part of Northampton Contemporary Art’s Sensing Place festival. Out of about 50 people, only one man resolutely declines. He sits on a chair while his wife joins us in warmup exercises.
