The Shanghai branch of the Beijing-based International Festival Chorus put on a show at the M on the Bund yesterday afternoon, with the 16-member choir performing a 90-minute concert called "Broadway on the Bund."

The founder and conductor Nicholas Smith brought three singers from Beijing to join the performance.

"Festival chorus is a tradition in Britain, indicating the chorus has only rehearsed for a short-time before the concert," said Smith, a full-time consultant working in Beijing.

Arriving in China 13 years ago, the music graduate of the University of Cambridge founded the IFC two years ago. After its first concert in the Forbidden City in front of 1,500 people, the choir has around 100 members, with up to 80 percent of them expatriates, and has given seven other concerts.

Another two Englishmen, Mark Gooding and Patrick Muhlen-Schulte, decided to develop a Shanghai branch last year. Last December, the duo, along with four other expatriates in Shanghai and 10 singers from Beijing, performed a concert at M on the Bund under the baton of Smith.

About one month ago, the first audition was held. As a result, 20 new singers were recruited.

"Among them, there were students, teachers and company workers, including 17 expatriates and three locals," said Gooding, who works for the British Consulate-General in Shanghai.

Pamela Kerr, a teacher at the Sydney Institute of Language and Commerce at Shanghai University, decided to try the audition after she heard last December's concert with her colleague.

(eastday.com March 22, 2004)