It Takes a Choir

Episode 1

Fort Riley's Army of Voices

Mon, Dec 29, 201443 mins

Gareth believes that spouses of military personnel, especially those personnel who have been shipped overseas into combat zones, are often the forgotten components of military life. He thus wants to give those spouses a voice, figuratively and literally, as well as provide them with a social outlet to get their minds off of worrying about their spouses. Fort Riley military base is his chosen locale to start a military spouses choir. The first challenge he faces is that spouses not only include wives, but a small minority of husbands, who he does not want to exclude, but also can't have those few number of bass clef voices sticking out as they would in such small numbers. The next issue is that although he finds that they as a group are good singers, they are not expressive having shut down emotionally, which he wants to change without them totally falling apart from letting those emotions flow, especially as one of the songs, "Breathe", is meant to be sung to their spouses. This issue becomes even more difficult with news of Fort Riley military personnel deaths in Afghanistan, but which Gareth hopes will be bolstered by the support of the choir as a collective. Gareth hopes that a surprise he has for the concert will inspire the choir to a magical performance.