Choirs 'like a big hug' offer antidote to loneliness

As the sun sets behind the escarpment and the winter chill sets in, a vibrant choral scene comes alive under a disco ball-adorned marquee at a coastal bowlo.

It's a simple weekly ritual for loyal attendees of the drop-in, drop-out choir at the Wombarra Bowling Club, in the NSW Illawarra region, and they say it's about much more than making music.

In between belting hits by Fleetwood Mac, Amy Winehouse and Midnight Oil, newcomers to the area have found friends, and others have found romantic partners.

Some even say it's been a space to process grief and cheaper than therapy.

'Needed to be around people'

Leah Russell hasn't missed a Wednesday session at the bowlo, north of Wollongong, in the 12 months since she joined after news of a friend's diagnosis left her craving community, especially in the winter months.

"You start losing light behind the escarpment from about 2 o'clock in the afternoon," she said.

"Mid-winter is incredibly dark. People in this area seem to just head home. I was feeling it in such an incredible way last year when a friend of mine was dying of cancer.

"I found I didn't have the capacity to talk to people, but I needed to be around people."

Weeks after Ms Russell's friend died last December, a song from the funeral, Carole King's You've Got a Friend, was coincidentally picked for the group to sing.

Ms Russell stood there and wept while choir members, unaware of her friend's death, put their arms around her.

"I didn't know anyone there well enough to tell them what was happening in my life at the time," she said.

"But I didn't have to talk about it. I just got to stand there and cry and they kept singing. It was really beautiful."

During the day, the choir's director Victoria Carrier works as a service delivery provider for suicide prevention organisation Roses in the Ocean.

She launched the weekly singalong last year as a "direct call to suicide prevention" in her community, creating a "fun" space for people to regulate their emotions and reconnect in a digital age.

"The choir gears away from the clinical system and into the community model," the Wombarra woman said.

"Singing really strengthens the vagus nerve, which is a really great way we can ground our nervous system."

Ms Carrier said members had told her it had become their "antidote to loneliness".

A short drive south, about 100 choristers of all ages gather in a community hall in Thirroul for Slapdash Choir, run by speech pathologist Elliot Peck.

"We've literally had sessions where we've had a one-year-old and a 100-year old," he said,

"People have met their current partner at the choir, some have met new housemates."

Mr Peck's mission is to make singing as accessible as possible in a casual environment, but sometimes, the group belts ballads so beautifully, including Beyonce's Halo and Coldplay's Fix You, that they move themselves to tears.

"What wins me over every time is knowing people are feeling those spine-tingling moments that I'm feeling too," Mr Peck said.

Others have found an answer to loneliness and a cure to burnout.

Lawyer Tanya Mitchell joined the choir after making the move to the Illawarra from Sydney. She isn't new to group singing, but no choirs have left her feeling as awe-inspired as Monday nights at Slapdash due to Mr Peck's focus on harmonies.

"He sometimes puts us in five parts of harmony and there is something so beautiful about singing like that with 120 people," she said.

"When we come together in harmony is such a magical moment that feels like you're inside a big warm hug.

"It's such a physical, visceral sensation."

Ms Mitchell often arrives exhausted, stressed and burnt out from her demanding role, and leaves feeling revived and energised.

The science behind the 'warm hug feeling'

Sandra Garrido, a senior research fellow in brain sciences at The University of Sydney, has studied the connection of music and wellbeing, including treating ill mental health for adolescents and dementia for older people.

Dr Garrido said the COVID-19 pandemic emphasised how singing in groups was used as a source of coping, citing the viral videos of quarantined Italians caroling on their balconies to keep up morale as an example.

"Our brain rewards behaviour that is good for us. So when we communicate with others via music, we get a dopamine rush," she said.

Dr Garrido said the "warm hug" feeling was likely due to emotional contagion or the unconscious tendency to mimic and absorb the emotions and behaviours of those around you.

"We get a bigger emotional experience from sharing the experience with others if we were just singing along to the radio alone," she said.

"It's like when you go to the cinema and there's a funny or sad moment. It amplifies your experience of that emotion and you feel it more strongly than if you were watching it on the television."

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