Episode list

Every year the Glossop Choir come second in the annual choral contest and this year they aim to come first.Choir master Michael Caddick sees his chance when glamorous soprano Layla joins their ranks, walking out on his long-suffering wife Esther, the previous leading lady, to feature her as star soloist and to be with her. But Esther has the last laugh when she enters her talented, autistic teen-aged son Kyle and his rock band All the Small Things in the contest. The presence of herself and several of her friends as back-up singers make up the required number of entrants and they carry off the prize. The young curate Jake - who appears to have a history with Layla - and most of Esther's friends are on their side. But Michael declares musical war on his wife.

Having entered the choir into a contest, Layla encourages Michael to be ruthless.

Gilbert Tonks is doubly outraged when Michael gives his customary solo to talented young Serb chorister Nemanja and Jake, anxious to create a community centre in the church,gives his over-priced decorating tender also to Nemanja. When Tonks, his snooty wife and their airhead satellite Lulu Pryke try to bully the lad and his older girlfriend Sofija into resigning, it is inevitable that the couple will embrace All the Small Things. Not only is Michael's choir decreasing but he has cause to query Layla's stability when she buys him a matching white dog and baby grand piano.

With the newly-wed Radics gone, Michael's choir is struggling, somewhat to the amusement of reluctant accompanist Monica, so Ethel Tonks, having declared the Serbs' church art designs as "sacriligious",brings her relatives in as reinforcements. Olive, Esther's best friend and a prime mover in the breakaway group, enters All the Small Things for the North West choral heats, where they do well, despite Layla's efforts to sabotage their transport, and even Michael is impressed. He is less enamoured of Layla's insistence that they start a family of their own and Georgia, the only child to show loyalty to her father, berates him for leaving her mother for such a stupid bimbo. However, Olive is starting to bond with fellow ageing rebel Jimmy, as is Esther with Jake.

After Monica's brother Edgar, an ageing rocker, drops down dead at his 60th birthday bash, it is revealed that Monica and Ethel are actually sisters,who have barely spoken to each other in twenty years and, whilst Ethel inevitably demands a conventional funeral, Edgar's last wish is for a hard rock ceremony. Monica holds the ace card by divulging that she and Gilbert were once lovers, and Edgar's wishes are honoured. Ethel acquires some dignity with her acceptance of all this but Layla's 'family' dinner party goes awry when Michael defends Kyle's faddy eating habits. Esther rebuffs Jake's sincere advances before he tells her that he is Layla's brother.

Jake is upset when Esther berates him for not explaining before that Layla was his sister and the vicious Layla, failing to gain Jake's sympathy, sends an anonymous letter, exposing her brother's former alcoholism. Ethel and Gilbert want him sacked but, after a hung vote, the not so dusty vicar persuades Layla to redeem herself and save Jake's job. Grace and Kyle run away and Esther and Michael locate them at an old holiday haunt - Michael wants reconciliation but Esther explains that she is now a free woman. At the choir finals Esther is shocked when All the Small Things try to sabotage Michael's singers by heckling them, fleeing to a station platform, where her choir, and Jake, join her for a rousing performance of Beethoven's Ode to Joy.