Rise Up and Sing

Hope + change through song

Rise & Connect!

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Group Singing

This section of our website helps you find out about ways people are singing together:

Singalongs & Songcircles  Find a monthly singalong or song circle near you - or consider starting one! Go to our SINGALONG FINDER

Singalong Concerts describes the concerts where Annie Patterson as well as many other musicians lead audiences in singging together building on the long tradition of Pete Seeger's concerts.

Using Singing  describes ways people use singing in a lot of different specific settings including families, schools, faith communities, and social change groups

Songleading Tips  provides ideas for how to successfully get others singing with each other.  We will be posting videos on this in the future.

Why is communal singing so important?

Pete Seeger told us a year before he died that if this world survives a hundred years from now it may well be because of people singing together.

Singing with others builds community, creates hope and resillience, and empowers people to make the world a better place for all of us and future generations.

And now a study done in Oxford (England) even found scientific proof that grouping singing draws strangers closer together! Oxford study

Annie was interviewed for the Jan. 2019 issue of The Oprah Magazine (pg. 50 an article on singing in the "Feeling Good" section). They wrote there that: "Rise Up Singing - the bible for community sings, camps, and schools - has sold nearly a millin copies, says Annie Patterson, who first complted the book with her husband in 1988. Patterson's website includes a list of nearly 70 song groups that meet in living rooms, coffeeshops, community centers, and churches from Maui to Ithaca NY."

People have been singing with each other since humans first walked the earth. In this electronic age participatory group singing is becoming a bit of an endangered species.  But people still do sing with each other in a host of different settings:

Regular ongoing sings are held in many communities.  Many of these sings use Rise Up Singing.  Others are song circles where participants take turns singing to each other, sing a capella, or gather using other books liked Sacred Harp