Pitch Please is an a cappella group from St Andrews University, Edinburgh. They won the Scottish A Capella Champinionships in March '15, and have an album being released in April. Broadway Baby finds out about their new show.
We have girls in our group from all around the world, from Hong Kong to the United States to Malaysia. Getting everyone together for rehearsal is difficult so we do just a week of rehearsals before our run. This can be slightly stressful after not having sung together for three months!
Tell us about your show
We are an all-female a cappella group, hailing from the University of St Andrews. Having won the Scottish A Cappella Championships in March 2015 and releasing an album in April, our show promises to bring more sass and musicality than ever, packed with songs from a variety of different genres. But this show will not simply be song after song. We aim to create a unique, engaging and hilarious experience for our audience, weaving in audience participation with our first class music. Having received two five star reviews over the past year, we want to improve and draw bigger audiences in and also grow as a group through our run in Edinburgh.
Why did you decide to take your show to Space UK this year?
This will be our fourth year at a Space venue and our third year at Symposium Hall. The Space is a fantastic venue for a cappella with great acoustics and an intimate enough setting for audience participation. The venue space allows us to bring in just the right amount of people to make our show feel intimate as well as creating an exciting atmosphere and getting the audience pumped up. The staff are wonderful and very helpful. The community of all the Space venues is very unique for the Fringe, with the thousands of venues in the city. We enjoy getting to know all the other companies in our venue and around the Space venues. There are such wonderful shows that are brought to the venues and it is very exciting to see the amateur talent that Edinburgh attracts.
Why Edinburgh? What’s the attraction?
The Edinburgh Fringe is a completely unique experience and opportunity to showcase our songs to people who may never have seen us or even been to an a cappella show before. We are able to reach out to people on the streets and in other venues to tell them about our show. It is great to see the huge amounts of talent on the Royal Mile and get to know other performers and learn from them. There are many different a cappella shows at the Fringe which allows us to interact with other groups. It is also a great opportunity for us to bond as a group and grow musically as we spend a lot of time together arranging and coming up with show ideas.
What makes your show unique amongst the thousands of others at the festival?
Our show will appeal to many different ages and musical interests as we incorporate different genres. We believe the key to a successful show is enjoying ourselves on stage. We absolutely love what we do and we think that this helps the audience relax and enjoy themselves too. This mixed with expert arrangements and choreography creates an inspiring and entertaining show produced entirely by students. We are unique amongst the a cappella community, especially with regards to all-female groups, as our show is not simply song after song but has a narrative and allows to audience to engage and become involved in the show.
What has been the biggest challenge in getting your show ready for Edinburgh?
We have girls in our group from all around the world, from Hong Kong to the United States to Malaysia. Getting everyone together for rehearsal is difficult so we do just a week of rehearsals before our run. This can be slightly stressful after not having sung together for three months!
Can you tell us a bit about your company’s background?
We are an a cappella group from the University of St Andrews. The group has been around for about twenty years and constantly changes every year with girls graduating and joining the group. This makes it exciting and challenging, catching girls up with repertoire and incorporating them into the close knit group we have.
Show Name: Pitch Please
Production Company : The Accidentals
Venue: theSpace @ Symposium Hall
Dates: 17th-22nd August
Times: 19:20 (50 mins)
Twitter Handle: @loveaccidentals
