It seems like yesterday that Sing Now Choir, Love Soul Choir and SingForce came together as a family to surprise the John Lewis staff and Christmas shoppers with a ‘Flash Moz’ of their (2017) heart-warming, Christmas campaign song, Golden Slumbers.
Astonishingly, that was one whole year ago now, but we are so thankful to be linked with John Lewis Southampton, enabling us to perform for them regularly.
It was a pleasure for us to sing and film our ‘Flash Moz’ there, having been inspired by the advert.
The simple, relatable story of childhood fear, the friendship that develops between the boy and his blue, under-the-bed monster, and the comforting lyrics (sleep pretty darling do not cry, and I will sing a lullaby) stirred, for us at Choir, the build-up to Christmas, and we wanted to be part of the story.
Anticipating big brands’ Christmas ad-campaigns and songs has become an exciting Christmas tradition in the UK, and it was John Lewis (2007) who founded the idea of advertising by story-telling, to enable people to fall-in-love with the brand, rather than the things on their shelves. It ‘gets you’ on a more emotional level. It inspires loyalty. The tender (always tear-jerking) plots evoke warmth, trust, family and the understanding that people should be valued, and not products. There is no better time to start remembering this than at Christmas. (And there is no better way to attract a devoted customer.)
But the creative plots and stories would never come-to-life without the music.
Music brings people together.
The song choice is what we all wait, in anticipation, for.
Every person’s ideal of family is different. Every family in the world looks different. Our families are sometimes our direct relations, and sometimes the people we relate to the most are the families we choose to belong to. They might be Moz the Monster, Monty the Penguin, The Man on the Moon, Buster the Boxer or even Kevin the Carrot! No matter who our best ‘people’ are, it is music that brings us together.
When we come together as a family to rehearse at Sing Now Choir, we are rich.
We are so proud of our choir family and all the rich things we individually contribute to it. We value and support one another, we celebrate one another, we welcome everybody and we feel good. We create friendships with people of different ages, backgrounds, circumstances. We come together and connect. When you feel good about something, you want to share it. For this reason, it is exciting and moving for us to see music and singing playing such a prominent part in the making of the Christmas adverts. Choir singing is what we adore, and it is becoming more-and-more popular, now that more-and-more people are experiencing the benefits of it. Music unites people. Music is indispensable and medicinal.
Music makes you happy.
We all feel this way at Sing Now Choir.
We don’t know where we would be without it.
The (2018) Boots advert shows the impact of choir singing unequivocally, promoting the idea that singing loud-and-proud, or doing-what-you-love, will warm the hearts of your loved ones and bring them closer to you. It allows them to see your independent value. What bigger gift is there, than the look of pride and appreciation in the eyes of people that love you. How rich you are when you have that. How poor you are when you don’t. Thoughtful gifts and messages of encouragement that show people ‘get you,’ are a bonus, and worth so much more than buying for the sake of buying. We need to remember, all year round, that appreciation is the greatest, strongest gift you can give. It makes, what is excellent in others, belong to us as well.
It allows people to know their own worth, which is a hard thing to know, on your own.
We are rich, at Sing Now Choir, when we go out and perform to crowds of people, and see the audience enjoying themselves. It makes our family circle wider. It is a language everyone understands. We can make complete strangers feel happy, and we can make our friends and family proud when they take time to come and watch us, for which we are always grateful (especially the cold, Christmas gigs.) The relationship between our choir and our audience is a mutual one: the audience want to be uplifted, and we want to uplift them, and it doesn’t cost a thing. The (2018) Sainsbury’s advert demonstrates this perfectly, with humour. How uplifting! How fantastic is the plug! How amazing that a Sainsbury’s Christmas-ad song choice by New Radicals, is now a wonderful Christmas theme song. We are no longer producing Christmas songs about Santa baby, reindeer, hanging stockings, Christmas trees, mistletoe and wine. The Christmas TV advert campaigns are leading the way creatively, and how desirable to have that for a job.
You Get What You Give. You’ve Got the Music in You.
Christmas is when family holds-hands with music and you celebrate one another.
No-one has more music inside them than Elton John, and, this year, he became the first artist to perform and star in the advert for John Lewis. The advert takes us back in time, through his life, to the key moment he unwrapped his Grandmother’s piano.
Despite the fact that we know the formula (touching story about family + beautiful song) we, as humans, will never be bored of this advertising technique. We will always relate. Whether you love Elton John Lewis, or whether you love-to-hate it, the message is strong and true to the theme that runs throughout this piece. Some gifts are more than just a gift, but the biggest gift, is having the ability to give others the confidence, that your life would be less wonderful, without them in the world.
Merry Christmas Everyone.
Keep Singing.
Blog written by Claire Murphy