by Author Phil Day

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CLIC Sargent's Virtual Choir Project for Young People With Cancer

A group of young cancer survivors have released a touching music video as a ‘virtual choir’. The 23 singers, all of whom have been affected by cancer, all sang pop superstar Sia’s The Greatest at various times throughout the year. The performance release launches the charity’s new month-long #Nofilter4cancer campaign, which aims to raise awareness of the hidden emotional and mental costs of cancer for young patients.

Young people told us how isolating having cancer can be, and how much they wanted to be involved in music making, even though they were unable to meet up together because of health reasons or geography for example. Hence the virtual choir project was developed as part of CLIC Sargent's Youth Music funded programme. After setting up guide vocal parts for young people to choose from and learn, when ready they sang along to a karaoke-style lyric video and sent in audio and video files of their performances. One budding laptop producer arranged and engineered the electronica backing track, and 23 other young people were involved in filming and recording themselves in various locations, throughout all English regions. Young people were actively engaged in the music programme, and in particular loved the positive message in Sia's lyrics. Sia retweeted the video to her 2m followers! Three young people involved for the first time through the virtual choir project, will now be joining the summer residential music workshop.