IT WAS no ordinary choir and they were no ordinary singers, but 18 courageous people recently took on an extraordinary challenge which has become an internet sensation.

The singers, all with chronic respiratory diseases, worked with Britain’s favourite choirmaster, Gareth Malone and put on a show-stopping performance in New York.

And among them was an Ammanford ex-pat who has told how her role in the Phillips Breathless Choir was “empowering.”

The members of the choir were first brought together in September after a casting call went out by technology company Phillips.

And it was at that point that Cynthia Davies, born and bred in Ammanford but now a ceramics teacher in Manhattan, joined the story.

Cynthia, aged 65, who says she learned her love of singing at Ebenezer Chapel, had first encountered problems at the age of 28 when, following a bad cold she had to have half a lung removed and she developed bronchiectasis.

Last year she got sick and the story developed from there.

“I was surprised to find my lung capacity had dropped to 30 per cent,” said Cynthia who has lived in New York for 30 years with her lifelong partner William Hiroshi Loob, a food, wine and beer writer.

“By the time I came home from my Pulmonologist, an oxygen concentrator, tubes and mobile oxygen was being delivered to my home- It all took a bit of getting used to.

“I returned to work in March , where my art assistant, Sacha Jones from Newport , informed me of a friend that knew of a commercial casting company looking for someone using oxygen."

The audition was for Gareth Malone and the Breathless Choir, a project set up by Philips as part of their drive to change people’s perceptions of their brand into a Health Tec organisation.

Cynthia, who has family in Ammanford including nephew Mark and wife Michelle Davies who live in Carregamman and other nephew Alan and his wife Nicola, who live in the house Cynthia’s grandfather built on Margaret Street- was determined to have a go: “I got through the auditions singing Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and Calon Lan,” she says.

It was a chance for Cynthia- who was the only one to know who Gareth Malone was- to find once again that childhood joy she had from singing.

And she also fun working with Gareth – who has Welsh roots- and a chance reconnect with the UK sense of humour.

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“The whole experience was great,” says Cynthia, “and I think Gareth enjoyed it.”

“We’d catch each other’s eye and giggle. He was hilarious, and very patient.

“Some of us are quite sick, people were collapsing and struggling. But he got us all through.

“And it was incredibly empowering – I never thought I could have done something like that.”

After five intense days of training, learning to sing breath by breath the choir were ready and they showcased their determination with one-off performance of Every Breath You Take at the Apollo Theatre in Harlem.

 

The performance was filmed and produced by Philips into an emotional and up-lifting video which has now become a sensation, with 3 million plus hits on YouTube.

You can see the video, and discover just how Gareth brought back the members’ joy of singing, on our website.