METM choir

Choir members at METM24 smiling and getting ready to sing, while the conductor tunes her ukelele

The METM24 choir gets ready to sing while director Ruth Simpson sets the scene with her ukelele.
Photo credit: Ana Brígida Paiva

MET’s impromptu choir first found its voice at the closing dinner of METM08 in Split (Croatia), where a spontaneous group of enthusiastic but – it must be said – ill-prepared singers, at the instigation of Ailish Maher and under the improvised baton of Carolyn Newey, interrupted the closing dinner with an idiosyncratic version of On Ilkla Moor Baht ‘at (Yorkshire folk song), complete with chorus lines rendered in Croatian. Surprise gave way to bemusement and, finally, rousing applause. The seed had been sown.

Since then, the choir has been directed by Elke Bartholomäus, Cristina Faria, Christina Koch and Ruth Simpson, our current conductor, rendering songs in English and in the host country language.

Watch the METM choir performances in the links below.

2024
Se Canto (Occitan) and Eye of the Tiger

2023
Se g'han de dì (Lombard) and Blue Moon

2021 (online performance)
Hey Jude

2019
Tulipan (Croatian) and I will follow Him

2018
Himne dels pirates (Catalan) and Java jive

2017
Bella ciao (Italian)

2016
Una nineta (Catalan) and Luci care

2015
Ó rama, ó que linda rama (Portuguese) and Hard times

2013 
El Meu Avi (Catalan) and Wade in the Water