Have I told you that I HATE competition?

I mean, I'm glad if choral singing is becoming kewl, and dang, if I don't wish it were having a resurence in this country, and all, but stilllllllll -- a contest? Izat necessary?

June 22, 2008
Choirs are becoming cool
Choirs have never been more popular, and they’re set to become a Saturday-night staple
http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/tv_and_radio/article4171061.ece
There are many things about which the UK claims to be the envy of the world, but when it comes to choirs, the boast is justified. “It’s one of the things the UK truly excels at,” says the choral conductor Suzi Digby. “More than any other country, we have an amazing amateur tradition. We are the only country with a 1,000-year unbroken tradition of cathedral choir schools. It is one of the things we really do well.”
After years of decline, choirs are becoming cool, spurred by the success of the choirmaster Gareth Malone’s award-winning BBC2 series on choirs. There are now more than 25,000 registered in Britain. They make people feel good. “Choirs are the only place where people come together and express a common emotion,” says Digby, who is also passionate about music education. “That’s why football crowds sing and why choirs are incredibly valuable to society in general.”
In a series that will arguably do more to get people singing than the search for Maria, Nancy or Joseph, the BBC is celebrating the power of choirs in a new series, Last Choir Standing. Presented by Myleene Klass and Nick Knowles, and judged by Digby, the singer Russell Watson and the actress Sharon D Clark, it begins with 60 choirs from across the country, whittles them down to 15 for the studio heats, then invites the public to vote on the last six. The last choir standing will be hailed as the nation’s favourite choir.
Choirs have not always been sexy. “There was this idea that if you were going off to choir practice, you were a sad loser,” Digby says. “People also get a psychological block about singing. Parents say their children can’t, siblings laugh – it doesn’t take much for it all to shut down.” Yet the lung-filling, oxygen-pumping experience is so good at producing a serotonin-fuelled buzz that the Labour peer, No 10 adviser and “happiness tsar”, Richard Layard, recommends joining one for the feelgood factor alone.