A community choir is preparing to sing to its biggest audience ever when it takes to the pitch for the Rugby World Cup.
The Fulham and Hammersmith Choral Society will sing the national anthems of world champions New Zealand and challengers Argentina ahead of their sell-out match at Wembley Stadium on Sunday (September 20).
It means the choir, which usually considers an audience of 300 as a good turn-out, will now be preforming in front of 90,000 fans - while millions watch them on TV across the world.
Choir chairman Mary Millington Buck said the choir had spent the past couple of weeks polishing up their Spanish and Maori.
She said: “We got asked at the beginning of summer and was informed about two weeks ago which match we got, and we’ve got a really big one.
“New Zealand are the world champions and it’s completely sold out. It’s live around the world. We get good audiences, and if we perform to 300 people, usually that’s a good turnout.
"Now we’re performing in front of 90,000 people at Wembley and millions more on TV, and we’re just a community choir.”
The choral society is an amateur non-audition charity with around 100 members. Only 40 were needed to perform at Wembley Stadium so it was allocated on a first-come-first-serve basis during their first rehearsal back following the summer break.
The ages of those singing to millions range from their 20s to their late 70s.
Ms Buck added: “The Argentina national anthem is sung in Spanish and New Zealand is half-Maori and half-English so we are frantically polishing up our pronunciation of Maori and Spanish and learning it phonetically.”
The Group C match kicks-off at 4.45pm.
