A search has been launched for a barbershop quartet to thrill crowds at a historic Cumbrian hall.
Levens Hall and Gardens, in Kendal, wants to celebrate World Topiary Day in May with help from the quartet. The hall is the home of the world’s oldest topiary garden.
World Topiary Day falls on May 12 but the public celebrations tend to focus on the Sunday following that date, which is when the barbershop quartet would be likely to perform.
The Cumbrian heritage gardens is now asking for barbershop quartets, who wish to be considered, to send in a short video of themselves performing, but also suggest some suitable songs that they would sing, to help celebrate the event. These could be about trees, greenery, gardens or something else with a link to heritage, history or gardens. Song suggestions could provide the cutting-edge that the venue seeks when determining who to invite to play.
Additionally, details of the quartet’s charges and terms and any special requirements for their performance would also be required. All information should be sent to [email protected] by December 31, 2022.
As well as having an association with the cutting and trimming that absorbs the Levens Hall and Gardens gardening team from September through to spring, barbershop quartets are known for singing music in four-part harmony or what could be deemed a ‘tiered’ style.
Tiered topiary pieces have been the particular passion of the current Levens Hall and Gardens head gardener, Chris Crowder, who has held the post for over 30 years, contributing tiered delights to gardens in which 10 head gardeners have each made their individual mark since the topiary garden’s foundation in 1694.
“We shall be delighted to welcome a vibrant barbershop quartet to our world record-holding gardens for World Topiary Day 2023,” says Levens Hall and Gardens’ owner, Richard Bagot.
“This musical performance style has a rich heritage, just like our venue, and we are sure it will offer something different for our visitors. We look forward to receiving the videos and reels and are not necessarily looking for a professional quartet, just one that will bring a lot of life to the proceedings, so it could be an opportunity for an amateur group of enthusiasts to make their mark.”
World Topiary Day started during the lockdown in 2021 but really flourished in 2022, when restrictions were lifted and the occasion captured the imagination of topiary-owning gardens worldwide.
