Barbershop education provided by LABBS
As a British-based organisation with an entirely local faculty of top educators, LABBS is well-placed to support a wide range of general and bespoke education for our choruses and quartets.The Education programme
The Education and Judging Committee oversee a full rolling programme of separate education events throughout each year to fulfill the needs of all our membership:- General education days and regional festivals open to all LABBS members
- Judging Category-specific days aimed at music teams and music leaders in our choruses as well as quartets and members keen to learn more - 2024 will be the turn of the Singing Category!
- Directors Education focussed on 'Training the Trainers' - read all about the Directors Education 2024 event over a weekend in January
- Quartet Prelims, a popular event which encompasses competition and comprehensive bespoke coaching.
Harmony College
Our flagship event, LABBS Harmony College, takes place every three (or so) years and is an opportunity for any and all members to congregate and celebrate the best in barbershop education for a long weekend together. The event combines all our annual education programme events into one. Our next event in 2023 is already in the planning stages and we are expecting this to be our biggest and best yet.
Coaching
Adding to the main programme the many individual chorus and coaching evenings, days and weekend retreats which our talented Judges and Education Faculty representatives are available for all year long and across the whole country and you will see that there is something for everyone and the benefits of belonging to a well-resourced and local barbershop organisation are clear.
Online education
The following extract from our in-house magazine, Voicebox, gives you a flavour of what we provided to support our membership during the pandemic, with innovative on-line offerings:
"It is very satisfying to look back over the period of lockdown and recall all the high quality education events which have been delivered via Zoom and just how many of the LABBS family have been able to participate and support these events. We could never have imagined in the dark days of lockdown, how many positive outcomes we would be celebrating – from LABBS eOnline throughout Summer 2020 which brought many of our talented Judging Team into your living rooms with hints and tips on keeping your voice and performance in tip-top condition, to Performance Day for Music Teams and Quartets in January, to April’s introduction of our new polecat with top choruses teaching over half the membership our new song online, to Director’s Education focussed on getting back to singing, and finally our online quartet event in June."
