While in the shower, walking to school, in the car, or even while playing cricket — Ashane De Silva does it anywhere, anytime.
The 17-year-old King’s High School pupil has a great voice and he is not ashamed to use it, any chance he gets.
"The shower is my favourite place to practise. It’s got the best acoustics — the reverb is insane in there.
"I’m almost always listening to music, so whenever a song I like comes on, I just belt it out.
"My family tells me to keep it down when I’m in the shower sometimes, because they’re still trying to sleep", Ashane said.
For school music teachers, it has long been a notoriously difficult job to get boys to join school choirs.
But Ashane said that was changing now because boys no longer teased each other about being in what used to be thought of as a prominently female activity.
"I don’t know if I can speak for everyone, but I think it has made me just a little bit more popular."
And it also came with some perks - like getting time off school to go to choir practice and getting to make new friends, which included girls at Queen’s High School, he said.
King's and Queen's
He was among the singers in Polyhymnia - a 50-strong King’s and Queen’s High School combined choir, which competed at the Otago and South Canterbury Big Sing Regional Choral Festival in Dunedin yesterday.
Event co-ordinator Rosemary Tarbotton said the event attracted about 400 pupils from 15 school choirs, and the Southland Big Sing regional competition would be held today, at First Church, in Invercargill.
The top choirs would be selected from recordings of the events, and would go on to compete in the New Zealand Choral Federation Big Sing Finale in Wellington from August 29-31.
The selections would be announced on June 24.
She said next year’s New Zealand Choral Federation Big Sing Finale would be held in Dunedin again, bringing thousands of secondary school choristers to the city for a three-day event.
"The last time it was here was 2016. It’s exciting to see it coming back here."
Logan Park High School
St Hilda's
Taieri College
Otago Boys' High School
