Once upon a time there was a great choir. It described itself as a Pop Rock choir. A young lady joined, she was a keen singer and she enjoyed being part of the larger than life sound that it made en masse. Later she went to college studying pop music and after graduating she decided to launch her own rock choir. Now our young hopeful didn't want to just create a great choir, she wanted a choral empire. 'How about if I call this choir (by which I mean ever expanding group of choirs) 'Rock Choir' she thought. I can then do arrangements (even though these were just an expansion of the existing backing vocals of the songs she chose) and employ as many choir leaders as I need and export the Rock Choir phenomenon globally and makes loads of money. Of course I'll have to charge quite a lot to the punters, because I have to employ all these people and it's going to cost me a lot to get 'Rock Choir' through trade marking because it's already a standard descriptive term for this type of choir. Well after a long battle, she managed to get her trademark. That's when she started to persecute other choirs using similar material to hers and which described themselves as Rock Choirs. She said 'I've got a trade mark, you can't call yourself a rock choir' (note the absence of upper case) If you don't change your web-site so that 'rock choir' doesn't find you I will take legal action. Now this prohibition presumably applies to that great choir that she was a part of over ten years earlier.

Well, I think that this sucks! I don't suppose all those people who belong to her vocal empire realise that the huge premium they pay supports legal action against other choirs. So what do you think? Should choral societies persecute and possibly prosecute one another, or should they celebrate the wonderful choral renaissance that is taking place in the UK and particularly in England.