Singing for veterans is something close to my heart. I will be travelling to Normandy next week for various ceremonies to mark the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings. These include British, French, and Canadian ceremonies in Caen, Colleville-Montgomery, Ranville, Bayeux, Beny sur Mer, Ver sur Mer and Grangues.

Please check my social media for stories, videos, and photographs as the week progresses.

At dawn on 9th April I sang during a ceremony to commemorate the Battle of Arras. We gathered outside the Wellington Tunnels. Around twenty metres below us was a network of tunnels, which was expanded by largely Māori soldiers from the New Zealand tunnellers. Some of the tunnels are open for visitors today. Over 24,000 allied soldiers and officers sheltered there in 1917 before pouring out at dawn on 9th April in a surprise attack. The battle claimed over 250,000 casualties.

As the ceremony drew to a close, the sun rose and we heard birdsong and the gentle hum of Arras’s morning traffic. A peaceful contrast to the pandemonium and death of 107 years ago.

Last Sunday I sang during a poignant vigil at Vimy Ridge, France. As the sun set, graves stones were lit and we gathered to remember the fallen in the Battle of Vimy Ridge.

The Battle of Vimy Ridge in 1917 was the first battle in which all four divisions of the Canadian Expeditionary Force fought together. The large number of Canadian casualties mean that the battle has a significance place in modern Canadian history.

The Canadian National Vimy Memorial at Vimy Ridge has become a place of pilgrimage. The graves remind us of the human cost of war. The forests around the cemeteries, which are riddled with explosives planted over one hundred years ago, remind us of the cost of war on non-human nature.

For more information about the memorial, please visit the Friends of the Canadian Vimy Monument website.