The Spooky Men’s Chorale
St Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral 11/7/26
The Spooky Men’s Chorale
Stephen Taberner Spookmeister
’Men, singing songs. Some of them are funny.’ That’s what the overflowing audience had piled into St Mary’s Episcopal Cathedral to experience. Many of them had spent the afternoon in a singing workshop, of which more later. At the appointed hour fifteen men casually dressed in all manner of black and wearing a bewildering variety of headgear wandered in, looking around in awe at their imposing Gothic surroundings. They stood facing each other in the choir and a Georgian chant rang out, with deep, rich, dark, rough harmonies filling the space. It was our turn to look on in awe.
The Spooky Men’s Chorale (the Spooks for short) were formed in Australia a quarter of a century ago. Drawing inspiration from the Georgian male choirs of the Caucasus they sing vocal music with a raw, vibrant texture and perfect clarity. They inhabit the lower frequencies of the male voice, singing beautiful ballads, highly inappropriate covers, and absurdly witty original pieces - all with adventurous melodies and glorious, gnarly harmonies. This evening saw a characteristic cocktail of all three, interspersed with irreverent commentary from founder and Spookmeister Stephen Taberner.
After encouraging the audience to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to them in celebration of their 25th anniversary, they sang ‘We Are the Spooky Men’ in case we were in any doubt, followed by a song called ‘What’s Going to Happen Now?’ We had no idea, but we knew it was going to be fun. What did happen was that scores of workshop members joined the Spooks for a magnificently intricate rendition of a gorgeous ode to love, ‘The Sweetest Kick in the Heart’. Audience participation was an integral part of the evening, and we were encouraged to join in and go bananas to ‘Tee Tee TayTay’, a sublime mashup of Tina Turner and Taylor Swift numbers. The dozens of people clapping, singing, and dancing in the aisles was a sight to gladden the heart of the most enthusiastic preacher.
The tempo changed yet again with Joni Mitchell’s wistful ‘The Fiddle and the Drum’ followed by ‘Ba’hari Ghibb’, a sublime send-up of the Bee Gees’ ‘Stayin’ Alive’ performed as a mock-Sufi chant complete with tall hats and an appropriate amount of whirling. You had to be there. And I’m very glad I was.
After the interval the Spooks performed a piece called “Welcome to the Second Half’, followed by another Georgian chant sung antiphonally from both sides of the nave, using the Cathedral’s admirable acoustic to enhance the ethereal chant. Then they spread along the central aisle to give us a stripped-back, Spooky version of Dolly Parton’s ‘Jolene’, and donned horned Viking helmets and Swedish accents to present Abba’s ‘Dancing Queen’ in the style of a Swedish folksong. In one of many lightening changes from the deliciously daft to the utterly serious, we heard the 800 year old ‘Holy God Chorale’ followed by a Georgian horse riding song, with voices chiming like bells ringing out over the steppes, faster, slower, higher, lower. Then came a patriotic Ukrainian folk ballad sung with fierce joy.
After a unique version of the Rolling Stones’ ‘Satisfaction’, the penultimate song was a beautiful rendition of ‘Crossing the Bar’ with words by Alfred, Lord Tennyson. I have heard this version twice at funerals, and it never fails to reduce me to tears. Finally Queen’s ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ reimagined as a knee-slapping, toe-tapping, yodelling Country and Western song brought the audience to its feet in a standing ovation, demanding an encore. The Spooks obliged with a gentle version of Burt Bacharach’s ‘What the World Needs Now (is Love, Sweet Love)’. What the world needs now is more of the Spooks’ unique mixture of absurdist humour and sincerity underpinned by a deep musicality, spreading the Spooky gospel of love and lunacy.
The Spooky Men’s Chorale https://spookymen.com/
photo credit: Nigel Plant
