Athlone native’s new book tells uplifting story of High Hopes choir

In August 2020, when the pandemic was but a few months old, Cathy McCarthy decided to set herself a challenge.

An affinity for people on the margins of society, which she can trace back to her upbringing in Athlone, had brought her into contact with the Waterford High Hopes Choir, and she thought the choir's story was worth capturing in a book.

Cathy duly published Our Stories Through Song: The Uplifting Story of the Waterford High Hopes Choir in October. A year's worth of hard graft went into creating the attractive publication, and it has been very well-received.

The book has already raised more than €12,000 for the choir which was set up to help people recover from addiction, abuse, mental health issues, illness and the effects of homelessness.

In addition to outlining the choir's background, and telling the stories of many of its members, the book includes contributions from the likes of singer Glen Hansard, homelessness campaigner Fr Peter McVerry, broadcasting legend Mícheál Ó Muircheartaigh, immunologist Luke O'Neill, and many others.

The book's author has been based in Dublin for many years but remains proud of her local roots in Deerpark Road. Writing in the introduction, she said her interest in supporting the homeless stemmed from the influence of her late parents.

Cathy is a daughter of Catherine and James Crehan. Her father was a building contractor and local councillor in Athlone, and in the book she said he "loved people and was involved in many aspects of community life."

"This gave him the opportunity to support people to acquire housing. My mum, too, in her own quiet way helped many people. I have no doubt that their kindness and empathy had a significant influence on my sisters and me.

"As I reflect back I believe this example led to my involvement with the (High Hopes) choir."

Cathy is a cancer survivor who wrote her first book, Not The Year You Had Planned: A Positive Self-Help Book for a Cancer Journey in 2011.

Five years later she followed it with Stronger Than Yesterday: Living Your Life Beyond Adversity, and it was this book which led her to the choir.

Cathy donated half of the proceeds of the 2016 book to Jack Kavanagh, a young man paralysed in a surfing accident, and she was open to suggestion on a cause to which she could donate the other 50%. High Hopes was started in 2014 by Irish conductor David Brophy, with regional choirs in Dublin and Waterford. Cathy and her family had lived in Waterford for ten years and a friend put her in touch with the choir there.

"I liked what they were doing, so I decided that half of the money would go to them at the time, and now all the money from all of the books goes to the choir," she explained.

"I didn't expect to have any contact with them after that, but the man in charge began to invite me to concerts. I ended up singing with them at Electric Picnic in 2016, then we went on a trip to Brussels, and I just became involved with them quite by accident."

Our Stories Through Song is a very accessible and engaging book. As the title suggests, each of the stories it contains is paired with a song on a similar theme.

For example, a piece about Ralph McTell's poignant ballad The Streets of London accompanies the story of 'Mousie', a choir member who battled homelessness and drug addiction in England.

Cathy spoke to him about the choice and he told her, "Cathy, I've lived every word of that song."

She paired George Harrison's Here Comes The Sun with the story of the choir's appearance at Electric Picnic.

"The weather was horrible that day, but when we went onto the stage to sing, the sun came out," she recalled.

"So every song in the book was significant and had some kind of meaning for the story. The concluding song is Hero (by Mariah Carey), and to me all of these people are heroes because they have come through a lot.

"The choir gave them a sense of belonging. When they went to sing in nursing homes and hospitals they really felt they were giving something back to society. They saw the platform the choir gave them as a way that they could do that."

Writing the book in the midst of the pandemic was challenging and it meant that phone interviews had to take the place of face-to-face conversations. "It was difficult at times to get the information that I needed, but I persisted," she said.

Outside of the choir, she approached some well-known personalities about contributing to the book and received a favourable response.

"With people who are involved with the homeless, like Sister Stan (Sr. Stanislaus Kennedy), I decided to email or text them and they said, yeah, we'd love to do it.

"I went to Professor Luke O'Neill because I came across his number on the internet! I was surprised when he said he would do it, but I knew that he loved music and was involved with music.

"Glen Hansard came to me through someone else I knew. He was very nice. He gets loads of requests for different things, and when I asked him why he responded to my email, he said it was because he knew I wasn't out for myself.

"He got a sense of what I was trying to do, and I ended up speaking to him on the phone for about 40 minutes one day. A lot of things came together that I didn't expect."

The book was launched at a concert in Waterford in November and there are tentative plans to bring the choir to Dublin for a second launch after the Covid situation improves.

Cathy and her husband Billy had fundraised to cover the production costs of the book and as a result she is now selling it for a very reasonable €10. With all of the proceeds going directly to the choir, people have been very generous and have often given more than the asking price.

"Some people would buy a book and hand me €50," said Cathy. In one case, a friend of a friend of hers got in touch after learning about the book and donated a whopping €2,000.

The €12,000 the book has raised so far for High Hopes will be beneficial as the choir aims to bounce back from a very challenging couple of years.

"Covid has been a terrible setback. It's not just an ordinary choir. The choir would see themselves as a family, and they would go on trips together," said Cathy.

"The members are very reliant on each other. A lot of them live on their own and found the pandemic very difficult."

She said the pure enjoyment of singing together had also been sorely missed.

"The choir gets such energy (from performing). One man said to me, 'when we go out to sing on stage, that feeling lasts with me for about five days afterwards.'

"The bond it creates between people really means a lot to them and gives them a sense of purpose," she said.

* To order a copy of 'Our Stories Through Song: The Uplifting Story of the Waterford High Hopes Choir' you can contact Cathy McCarthy directly at: cathyamccarthy@gmail.com or on 087 6217796.

You can also order the book online at: www.waterfordhighhopes.com