In all the episodes of Sing While You Work thus far Gareth has tried to use the power of song to unite workers or to make certain people let their emotions out, however this week his aims are focussed on getting a bunch of burly workmen to become a part of his final choir.

This week Gareth is putting together his choir from the workers at Seven Trent Water which means he has to travel between the company’s call centre in Coventry and Leicester where the workmen are based.

At the start of the episode Gareth wonders what sort of people work at a water company but he soon finds out as he finds himself wandering around the slightly intimidating call centre building, in which the staff are flat out and the manager warns him from interfering in their work. While at the call centre Gareth finds it hard to actually recruit anyone for the choir and when talking to the workmen he gets the same responses as the last three weeks, namely that nobody can sing. Though we’ve seen this throughout the series I felt in this episode we got the best answer as one of the workmen told him that he couldn’t sing as he had no teeth. As usual a lot of people turn out for the auditions and Gareth is particularly impressed by leakage technician Josh who he feels has a great tenor ability.

The choice of song is also amusing, and after someone suggests ‘The Flood’ by Take That, one of their colleagues thinks it might not be the best idea as they often have to deal with people complaining about flooding. Eventually the choir choose ‘Proud Mary’ as their track, as it includes the ‘rolling down the river’ lyric and in their first singing session Gareth notes that they produce an amazing sound, while in particular he is impressed with the strong male section. Gareth then goes out with Josh to get to know his job a bit more and unfortunately it’s Josh’s family that ultimately means he can’t continue in the choir after his partner falls ill and he has to use his spare time to care for her. Despite this the choir’s first performance of ‘Proud Mary’ is well received by their workmates with one describing it as ‘well slick.’

Gareth’s second song for the choir represents their daily grind as he chooses Queen’s ‘Under Pressure’ based on the fact that he now understands how stressful working for the water company is. Gareth’s other job is to fill the hole left by Josh and eventually recruits his fellow leakage technician Jamie who is more than happy to join the choir. Gareth is impressed with Jamie’s positive attitude especially when he’s one of the choir members who put themselves forward for the solo auditions. Here Gareth is unimpressed that a lot of the singers he hears aren’t putting emphasis into the words they are singing, although to be fair Jamie does do a good job. Eventually Gareth hears some passion coming from Charlotte, who works in the company’s billing department, though her problem is her confidence as she struggles to remember the words to her part of the song. As he spends some time with Charlotte he learns that she finds it hard to get to know people at work, however being in the choir as bought out her social side and through her singing she has found a new strength. Of course after Gareth’s tutoring Charlotte’s confidence returns and she, along with the rest of the choir, are ready for their first big performance in the company’s atrium.

This week’s secret judge is Manvinder Rattan, who previously appeared in the first episode, as we see him hiding amongst the audience primarily made up of the choir’s family and friends. For me it seems the Seven Trent Water choir definitely have learned how to work together and their harmonies are some of the best I’ve heard throughout the series, though their confidence still isn’t there. In his summation Manvinder praises the sound that the choir has made but he criticises the way they presented themselves when they walked on stage, commenting that they looked nervous until they started singing. To me this is a fresh criticism that we haven’t heard from either judge before and it is a fair point from someone who believes that the performance begins when the choir walks on stage.

Overall we know what to expect from the format of Sing While You Work by now as once again the company discovers the power of singing. Though I don’t feel they’re the strongest choir we’ve heard throughout the series I think that Seven Trent Water still has a chance as we progress into the next stage of the series. I’m quite looking forward to the next two episodes in which we’ll see how all four choirs are getting along and for the first time they’ll compete against each other with one being knocked out of the contest before the final.

Are you enjoying Sing While You Work? What did you think to the Seven Trent choir? Leave Your Comments Below.