Set Song: Clearest Blue - CHvrches?

How we came to choose this year's set song

Yes, there is a process?

By now you will know we chose Clearest Blue by Chvrches as the first set song. It's a great song, it's Scottish, it's got a good vibe and it works. We could leave it there and maybe that's all we needed to do. But we thought we'd show that it's not a random process although as usual there is a bit of randomness to the decision.

The Theme: Contemporary Scottish Pop and Rock Artists

The starting point was last March. While everyone was belting out Spaceman, Major Tom Returns and their own Space theme related song we were exploring ideas for the 2024/25.and I suppose our tenth anniversary. We wanted something meaningful but different and we wanted to steer away from 'message' songs e.g. confidence building, team working as we see these aspects as natural extensions of what Glee is about. Discussions in the car on route to events and breaks in the office kicked around idea after idea

One idea that popped up and in fairness had been in our heads for a long time was Scotland but how and what? We wanted to maintain the contemporary nature of the Challenge holding on to the pop and rock genre mix which constitute most of our Glee shows. We didn't want a 'traditional Scottish music' or ‘highland dance’ event, both of which we feel are given excellent coverage and presentation elsewhere. Slowly the theme shaped up and we tweaked some aspects to create the 2025 Challenge, our tenth anniversary year, as a celebration of Scottish contemporary pop and rock artists/bands. Something, we believe that no one else has done

Contemporary Scottish Artists/Bands

In shaping the theme we had to consider what we meant. We know the distinction of contemporary at times is a thin one. First of all Laura created a Spotify list of 60 plus tracks which we listened to intently. We then literally listened to hundreds of tracks and artists, we found two Scottish artist albums on an old ipod nano, and watched the BBC Scotland's documentary series on Scottish rock and pop bands several times before arriving at our list. If you’ve not seen the documentaries, they are worth a look.

We aimed to showcase the numerous talented Scottish artists and bands and their impact on the wider pop and rock music scene. We compiled a list of artists and bands, acknowledging that we may have overlooked some and that our broad view of Scottish contemporary pop and rock may differ from others. But, we think our list works.

The set song - Clearest Blue; Chvrches

As the theme emerged we generated short lists of songs which went through several discussions and iterations. The usual rules applied - appropriateness, song length, engaging, a poppy sound and something we could live with, after all we're looking at over 300 renditions of the song. We eventually sent out a list of ten possible songs to our team and asked them to rank them. The Chvrches track wasn't among them. The votes came in, there wasn't a clear choice, partly due to different tastes but also due to the varying definitions of the theme. But we were closer.

We returned to the theme - contemporary pop and rock genre, Scottish Artists/bands all of which would enable contemporary dance and create a pop/rock feel in all of the gigs. The word gigs also provides a context - 'performances by a musician or group of musicians, especially playing modern or pop music'. We also want the Glee Challenge to retain its uniqueness and not to overlap with more traditional song and dance opportunities such as highland dancing. We decided to look again at the songs we had discarded.

Another few weeks of itunes and Spotify. There were two Chvrches tracks that had been suggested earlier so we mulled them over, again. Of the two, 'Clearest Blue' appeared the better fit - strong contemporary poppy sound, contemporary dance opportunity within the track, good length, clear lyrics, engaging, suitable pitch for young voices and a strong well known contemporary Scottish band. We also knew that supporting resources were available and we could build other resources if required. We had our track.

Set Song 2 and Your Song Choice

The Set Song Choice has been quite a journey and hopefully it highlights what we are looking for when you make your submissions. You have one asset in the decision making process that we didn't when we made our choice, your choir members.

Our search for set song 2 continues.