Blog of Frank Kermit of Frank Talks

Senpai Spotlight Interview – Encore Singing Chorus

6/15/2026

Posted by Roger Senpai | Jun 13, 2026 | Interviews

This interview original appeared on the Senpai Blog. You can click on the image below to see the original article:

It’s been a long time since I did a Senpai Spotlight interview. But I had to do one for this special occasion.

In this episode, I interview Frank Kermit from the Encore Singing Chorus. He is a relationship and dating expert. And today we learn how Frank stepped into the world of singing, joining a chorus and forming his group, and ultimately leading to an exciting upcoming chorus performance at Montreal Comiccon this year!

Here’s where you can find Frank Kermit online:

Frank directing the chorus

Official Website

Encore Encore Encore Chorus Group

Senpai: Hello everyone. This is the Senpai Blog. It’s been a long time since I’ve done this in a long time, but I had to do it for this very special occasion. Today we have Frank Kermit here.
For you guys that don’t know Frank Kermit, he is a relationship coach who has helped many, many people with dating, with relationships, and a whole lot of other stuff. But today we’re going to be talking about his next passion which is singing which is going to be an interesting topic to talk about. Good to have you Frank.

Frank: Thank you so much Roger. It’s great to be here.

Image courtesy of KAG.org, generated by AI

Senpai: Awesome. To get started, can you tell us about yourself and what you do?

Frank: I have been a life coach specializing in the world of dating and relationships for now over 25 years. I primarily help people who are neurodivergent. My biggest client base are adult male virgins and I help them get their first girlfriends. And over the last five years I have been in obese recovery. I have lost over 230 pounds and completely changed my lifestyle to go from very sedentary sitting at the computer to working a physical job losing the weight. Recently had the skin removal surgery and just experiencing what it’s like to have a new body and then the process of obese recovery.

One of the aspects that I’ve been learning about myself is I’ve always had an interest in singing, but I never pursued it. And one of my reasons for losing the weight was to one day sing. And over the last three years, I have been singing with choruses and then I started my own. And now I’m achieving a bucket list item that was on my list of things to do when I started the weight loss journey.

My chorus is going to be singing at the next Montreal Comiccon happening in July. And this is going to be a joint production between the EncoreEncoreEncore.com Singing Chorus and the Klingon Assault Group. And we are going to be singing 11 songs, most of which are related to Star Trek in celebration of the 60th anniversary of Star Trek. So 7 of the songs are in the Klingon language from the TV show.

One of the songs is an acapella version of Picard’s Inner Light. And to my knowledge, it’s the first time that somebody has produced an acapella version of that. We’re also going to be singing Reading Rainbow for Lavar Burton. And then we’re singing Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Spider-Man. And it’s going to be, we hope, a lot of fun.

Senpai: That’s wonderful. That’s a really interesting story. That was going to be one of my questions, but you pretty much answered it. But that that’s just a really good story that through your time of difficulty, that you another passion or rather a hidden passion that you’ve had all this time that that got you into singing. It’s led to a different pathway in life where you got to express yourself in a different way.

Frank: I’ve been doing a lot of work on myself both physically and mental healthwise. And I reached a point where I had dealt with enough of my demons. Now to be fair, I still have a few more demons to go. I’m still not 100% where I want to be with this. And look, it’s a work in progress, but I’m actually quite happy with how everything is progressing. And I am so excited to be singing at Comiccon with the Encore Cosplay Chorus.

Senpai: Is this your first time going to a cosplay convention?

Frank: No, I’d gone in the past. Last time I went was I took my son to it because my son really had an interest in going. And when I was morbidly obese at 460 pounds, there were there were days I couldn’t walk.

Father and son at Montreal Comic-con

So, one of my motivations was, okay, my son wants to go and do a bunch of things, so I’m going to lose weight to get healthy to take him there. So, I was at Comiccon. A couple of years ago as a way to okay, wow, I I’ve achieved something. I actually made it the Comic- Con and I have an interest in it. I love sci-fi.

I’m a big Star Trek fan. And while I was there, I was thinking, you know, I would love to sing here. And that’s cuz I had just started with the chorus as well. So, it’s like I would really love to sing here one day. And I added it to my list of reasons to get healthy. It’s happening now.

So yeah, I’ve been to conventions before, but I never took part in the cosplaying. I didn’t really feel comfortable dressing up and bringing attention to myself because I wasn’t I was comfortable with my body. I was comfortable being a bigger person, but I didn’t want to bring additional attention to it.

Now that I’m able to walk, I’m able to stand, I’m able to move, I’ve started singing. And I’m not the greatest singer, but I I think I can carry a tune. I thought this would be a really fun thing. So I connected with some like-minded individuals, and we’re going to do something that I don’t think has ever been done before.

Senpai: That must be really exciting! Not only do you get to take part in Montreal Comic Con with the singing, but you finally get to experience the convention (differently) now that you’ve lost all that weight.

Frank: It is just the fact that I’m going to be singing Klingon songs from Deep Space 9, Voyager, Star Trek, you know, I’m singing songs that I grew up watching on television that I’d always been fascinated about. And I got a group of people that want to sing those songs with me and it’s gonna be a lot of fun.

Senpai: Did you have any vocal training? Were you always a singer? Or was this just something that that you just decide to do, even without any training?

Frank: As a kid I gravitated towards songs that I watched on television. TV show theme songs were my main go-to. So whenever I was alone or when I was doing tasks, I’d be humming to myself, singing to myself. And I enjoyed it. I think I maybe took one or two classes back in high school or college, but it was basic vocal trainings. At the time, I didn’t know what it was I wanted to do with it. And in my head, I was always thinking, I’m just not a good-enough singer and why bother and who wants to hear me sing?

When I went into the world of dating, one of the things that I used to love to do is to sing to the people I would date and that was a really nice way to be romantic and do something special and sweet. But again, never took it further. Never sang in front of a group of people or anything like that. When I went into obese recovery and I started to do a lot of therapy to heal the trauma that I had been through. At one point I had reached a certain point of clarity and a voice inside me said, “Frank sing.”

So, I went and joined a barbershop chorus because I love barbershop harmony. And although I loved performing with that chorus and I just I really enjoyed the experience, the distance that I would have to travel to get to that chorus could sometimes be up to two hours, maybe more if I was relying on public transit. I would often have to rely on people giving me lifts. And then when the lift wouldn’t work out and then I’d have to find another lift and so on. It just became unmanageable.

At the time, I was working a physical job and I was able to arrange to have my schedule modified so when I go to rehearsal at night and come home really, really late, I could come in later the following morning. (But) at one point, you know, the company says, “Okay, well, we’ve been accommodating you now for a few months. You’ve had your show. We need you to go back to your regular schedule.”

The distance was really a factor, and I just decided I’m going to start my own chorus and I’ll choose the songs that always made me feel calm and comfortable as a kid, things that made me feel safe, and that is TV show theme songs.

So, that’s where it started. Started the chorus. We’ve released a few videos. I see it set up a trio within the chorus to sing certain songs. If you look them up on YouTube, you’ll find them. DuckTales, Math Patrol, which was a Canadian television show for kids many years ago. Happy Days, one of my personal favorites. And the chorus has gone through different incarnations (and) has finally evolved to the cosplay chorus because ultimately my goal was to go sing at Comiccon.

Photo courtesy of KAG.org of KAG members

In this chorus now, we have a couple of people who are going to cosplay as Klingons. We have a woman there who’s going to be an Orion woman. So, she’s going to be singing with us. Some of my chorus members will simply wear chorus garb. And you know it’s open to whoever wants to come and sing. You can dress up in whatever cosplay you want. It just happens that this year happens to be the 60th anniversary of Star Trek. So everything just came together with multiple songs from the Star Trek franchise.

Photo courtesy of KAG.org of KAG members

Senpai: Do you find (recruiting members) difficult? Or do you find a lot of people are really interested in in your group chorus?

Frank: There’s always a challenge to find people who want to participate. I’ve had people come and say they want to join a chorus and they want to sing, but they may not like the theme of TV show themed songs or songs from television and movies.

I think what is the most difficult is the traveling in the distance because I have had a number of people who say, “This is great. I’ve been wanting to do something like this all of my life.” But they’re also 2-3 hours away from where the location space is for the rehearsals. So, it’s always a balancing act. Sometimes you’re dealing with singers who are very very dedicated to the craft but are unable to get to rehearsals regularly.

So, I try to organize it that a group of singers will only come in once a week, once every two weeks because of the distance. They’re only going to work on a couple of songs, whereas people who can come more regularly get the opportunity to practice more songs just because they can come to rehearsals more often.

Photo courtesy of KAG.org of KAG members

What I found in this whole process is that finding singers is easier. Finding people to direct is more difficult. And finding people who want to do all the admin work of a chorus is next to impossible because there’s nothing fun about having to deal with all the paperwork and the rights and the clearances and so on. When I first started my chorus, I had somebody who stepped in to be a director so that I could sing and I’ll do the admin because somebody has to do the admin.

Over time, I’ve had a couple of different directors, assistant directors. And at one point, due to health reasons and just the way life goes sometimes, all of my directors had to back out for one reason or another. So, I reached a point where I had a chorus, I had the location, I had the music’s rights paid for, and I had a group of singers, (but) I had nobody to direct.

So I figured, “Well, if I don’t direct, there’s no chorus.” And I stepped into the director’s role. Do I like doing the admin work? Not really. Do I like doing the directing? No. But if I don’t do those things, there’s no chorus and I don’t get to sing. So, I stepped up to do that. And my hope is at some point as the chorus gains popularity and more people join that maybe some of the new members will step up and say (they’ll) direct a couple of songs and then they’ll be able to step into the director’s chair and I’ll be able to go back to singing.

Photo Courtesy of KAG.org of members of the Klingon Assault Group

Senpai: I feel you on that. It kind of relates to what I used to do when I ran cosplay events. Everyone would want to be part of the event, but no one would want to do the organizing, getting people together (etc.).

And (the logistics aspect) is kind of related to what you do with the chorus actually. I know a bunch of cosplayers who want to get together but they’re hours away. So getting them together was always pretty difficult. So I guess there are a lot of parallels between the preparing a chorus versus preparing like cosplay event, which is interesting.

Frank: Any anytime you’re dealing with a group of people who want to do a project, my goal is to always offer them a motivation, something that they can be a part of that’s larger than themselves. If all you do is say, “Hey, just come and have fun. It’s just going to be fun. It’s just going to be fun.” Well, then they’re showing up to have fun. They’re not showing up to do all of the administration and hard work.

However, if you frame it and give them opportunities within that framework that match what it is they would want, you’re going to find even more people will be excited to do it. So, I’ll give you an example, okay? Going up to people and saying, “How would you like to come and sing with a group?” Yeah, sure. That sounds like a neat thing. Being able to say, “Well, I’m going to put you in front of an audience of nearly 2,000 people, including the agents and representatives of various celebrities who are there.”

Now, suddenly people who have that motivation of “I would love to be a professional singer. I would love to show some voice talent agents what I can do with my voice. I’d like to get signed on to appear in a bigger production.” Now they’re incentivized to show up.

In cosplay, you want people to come in dressed to (be) looking spectacular. Well, just having them show up for the sake of showing up, that might be enough motivation for some people. But letting them know, look, I’m going to get a photographer who actually has some great skills to take some awesome pictures of you and then we’re going to go on a little campaign trying to share those images around and trying to get you more attention, trying to get you more notoriety. Here’s your name. Do you have a website? Let’s see if we can promote your website in the process. Now, there’s something in it for them. And when there’s something in it for them, you’re going to find that people are much more inclined to go above and beyond.

Everyone wants the fun parts of it, okay? Relating to a chorus, everybody wants to come in, show up, and say, “Here are the music sheets. Here’s the notes. Here’s the learning tracks. Come and sing.” Less people want to step up and direct because, well, it’s a lot more work. To oversee something like that and even less people want to do the admin. So if you’re the type of person that you’re willing to do the things you don’t like as a stepping stone to do the things that you love, then you’re going to be a lot more successful with these endeavours.

And that’s the same thing that I teach in both the dating circles when I do coaching as well as in obese recovery. In obese recovery, I don’t always enjoy the things that I need to do, but I do them anyway because I want to enjoy the benefits of better health. In the world of dating, sometimes I’m going to have to commit to the process and do things that I may not be completely comfortable with at first. But if you want to enjoy the benefits of being in the world of dating relationships or weight loss and good health, you’re always going to have to do things above and beyond that you don’t want to do so that you can enjoy all the good things that come from the results of doing the things you don’t want to do.

Senpai: Cosplay, in my opinion, is the same thing. There’s going to be things that you don’t enjoy, but in order to get the results you want, you have to do them like getting ready, putting on the costume, sweating, and trying to doing poses for photo shoots, which can be sometimes difficult to do, but if you want to get that really perfect Instagram photo, you got to do it. And it’s good point you make. I think anything in life, there’s never a free lunch, whether it’s chorus or dating or looking really really good in cosplay. So, I don’t think people realize just how challenging good cosplay is. I certainly know.

Frank: But most people don’t. They think, “Oh, you just put on a costume and go.” Well, it’s not just putting on a good costume, especially if you’re the one who’s making the costume. The details that go into that, the late nights, the work, because you have to do that stuff outside of all the other things you got to do in your life just to survive and pay the rent.

Then we get to the point where yeah, you now have the costume, but the videos, the posing, the hours and hours that it can take to get the lighting just right, to get the poses just right. A slight change in posture can make all the difference between a decent photo and a great production. Having to deal sometimes with fans who can be worse than haters. Sometimes when you get obsessive fans who you know want to come up to you and they say, “Hey, that’s a great costume. That’s awesome.”

But sometimes even the very fans that you have to appreciate can also cross some lines that you’re not comfortable with. And that’s just part and parcel of what people have to deal with. So, there’s a lot of challenges in great cosplay that most people don’t recognize. They’ll see the result and they say, “Wow, yeah, that’s a great result,” but they don’t see the hours and hours and hours of work that went into getting that result.

IXL Major Lashki vestai-Jazel Orion mercenary

Senpai: It’s not as easy as it looks. And yeah, there are some negative aspects too with cosplay that you brought up that make it, but that’s it makes it all worth it for the results in the end.
I wanted to go back to so my question was like you brought up a lot of stuff regarding your preparing for a performance as a as a chorus and it does seem a lot more complicated than it than it looks.. Can you tell me regarding this upcoming performance with Montreal Comiccon? What are the things you have to do to prepare for this performance at Montreal Comiccon?

KAG member at Montreal Comic-con

Frank: Well, we’ll start off by securing a rehearsal space. We have two rehearsals a week. And as we get closer to the date, we may increase that to three depending on when people are available. Choosing the songs, writing them out.

Now, in the case of Klingon language songs, finding it written in Klingon, you can do that by searching the net. But we’re not dealing with people who can read, write, and you know, speak full Klingon. We’re dealing with most people who are fans of the show and they think it’s kind of cool to sing songs in Klingon. So I had to go through a process of listening to the Klingon songs and then writing it out in English phonetically. So the spelling of it in the Klingon language is going to be very different from writing it in English to make it sound close enough so that when I’m teaching people who have never spoken Klingon to sing a Klingon song, they’re going to sing it in English and it’s going to be phonetically written. Then it’s a matter of just getting people to practice that over and over and over.

Some of the songs, the singing goes too quickly and it can be just various sounds put together and then I have to find a way to turn those sounds into closely related words and getting people to go through that. When we sing songs like the Spider-Man song, it’s going to be a two-part a cappella, which means you’re going to have one group of people singing one part, one group of people singing another part at the same time. So whereas one group is going to be singing the words, the other group is going to be singing sounds to accompany the words and being able to balance that.

There’s a lot of work in just in preparing the docents for people to follow along the photo copies. Oh, we’ve made changes. Oh, we’ve made notes. And then you have a sheet that has a lot of handwritten notes. Okay, I got to go back to the drawing board, rewrite the docent, include all of the notes, print it up again, hand it out, making sure that everybody has their costume, everybody has their passes., finding out who’s staying at Comiccon after the performance and who’s going to be leaving right away., it’s a headache. It’s a real headache to put something like this together.

The end result is we’re going to have a cool 45-minute set of about 11 songs that I really hope people will enjoy. One of the songs we’re singing is the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle theme song. And we’ve got the Turtle cosplayers who are going to come up and do a little dance performance while we sing for them. So, you’re gonna have a bunch of Klingons and Star Trek characters singing while the Turtles theme song while the Turtles are doing a little performance themselves.

My goal with this chorus was to do more of this. When we sing this Spider-Man song, we’re going to be inviting all the Spider-Man cosplayers to come up and maybe do some Vogue, take some pictures, take some video while we sing the Spider-Man theme song to them. You know, I would love to get enough cosplayers involved to do a big spider dance. You know, these are the types of things that I’m hoping to do in the future.

This is our first time out. It’s kind of an experiment. We’ll be singing at the entrance doors an hour before Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. An hour before they open the doors, we’ll be there for 45 minutes singing.

On the Sunday, I’ve invited a Barbershop quartet, the same group of people I used to sing with initially, and they’re going to sing a collection of different songs for about 20 minutes, including Over the Rainbow, couple of Lion King songs, a Jungle Book song, Disney in celebration of the 60th anniversary of Walt Disney passing.

So, there’s a lot that’s going to be going on. And I’m just hoping that the cosplayers feel respected and that they get something out of it, too. Because if they’re going to cosplay a certain character or from a certain show and then they hear a chorus singing the theme song of that show in the future, I would love to be able to sing the Pokémon theme song and get all the Pokémon card cosplayers as well as people who collect the Pokémon cards and the, you know, the merchandise. Have them come and enjoy it. Eventually I want to be able to sing at comic book shops, other conventions that there’s a whole audience of people that are going to love the nostalgia of these songs and what it brings out of them and how it makes them feel.

Barbershop singers The Little Devils, part of the South Shore Saints Barbershop Chorus

When you really want to connect with somebody and you can use this in dating, you can use this in any endeavour where you’re trying to connect with another human being. Get them to talk about some of their favorite TV shows or movies when they were a kid and then find a song from those favorites. And if you start to sing it with them, even if they haven’t even thought about it for years, it’ll slowly come back to them and they’ll start singing that theme song that they watched every week as a kid. And when the two people sing together, they form a connection. They form a bond.

So, right now to anybody listening, I want you to think of one of your favorite TV shows as a kid. Something you really enjoyed. It was your escape. (It) was your 30 minutes to an hour every week that you just got to forget about your problems, forget about the world and just enjoyed that program and start singing the theme song with other people who shared that same experience with you. You will form a bond with them. When you sing with them, you’re going to feel it in your veins. You’re going to get those goosebumps. You’re going to get those feelings of feeling safe and comfortable and all the enjoyment that you got from those programs. You sometimes you’ll just feel like a kid again. And that’s what we’re trying to do here.

Encore and KAG chorus members in Encore chorus uniforms

Senpai: That’s some good dating advice! I’ll have to try that out myself to sing. But you mentioned a lot a lot of things regarding the upcoming performance for Montreal Comiccon. It sounds almost like a full-time job.

Frank: I’m very excited about producing is the Reading Rainbow theme song. Actor Lavar Burton who plays Geordi La Forge on Star Trek, he’s very proud and passionate about children’s literacy. He hosted a TV show called Reading Rainbow and I’m hoping that once we make the video of Klingons and Star Trek cosplayers and chorus members singing the theme song of Reading Rainbow at a comic convention, that maybe somehow a video of that song will land in the hands of Lavar Burton’s agent and maybe he’ll even see the video and he will feel appreciated for the work that he did in children’s literacy.

Senpai: I’m sure once you guys perform, you get some re-shares and from various actors and writers from Star Trek. That would be awesome.

Frank: That would I mean it’s a way to give back to them. And I’m not just talking about the Star Trek franchise. Long term, I want to be able to give back to all of the people who created projects that made me happy as a kid. This is my way of saying thanks and respect to you.

Can you imagine what it’s going to be like for somebody who’s a real fan of a particular show, to take part in the production of singing the theme song directly to the actors and the cast and the crew? The people behind the scenes and we’re singing it back to them because we love it so much. What a wonderful experience that can be for those creators and technical people.

Encore and KAG members in Encore chorus uniform

Senpai: Absolutely. And even as for us cosplayers, we like to cosplay characters that that we grew up in our childhood. So we for sure know all about that going about the nostalgia and the throwbacks to our our childhood.

Frank: You know, there’s only one drawback in all of this. There just isn’t enough time. There just isn’t enough time to get a group of people all to learn all the songs. So, we do whatever we can. So, this time around, we’ve got 11 songs. For the next convention, I hope to have a few more songs and we bring in a few more cosplayers and we just keep going. And, you know, eventually I would love to have a repertoire of a couple of hundred songs. And, you know, it’ll be different singers for each song because each person is going to want to focus on their 10 or 12 songs related to their particular cosplay. But that’s that would be the goal long term.

Encore and KAG members in Encore chorus uniforms

Senpai: We talked a lot about your plans for Montreal Comiccon and what you did. My next question is — I know you’ve been doing this for a while — is there any particular performance that stands out as unforgettable, or one that had a real impact on an audience member?

Frank: There are actually a few. When my Encore Trio did the Happy Days song, it was because I had met one of the representatives of actors from that show online. In the span of one week, we learned the song, recorded it, shot the video, edited the video, and sent it to the agent, who ended up showing it to a couple of the actors from the show. That, for me, was really powerful.

First of all, just for the trio, it proved that we were able to turn around and complete a project of that magnitude in seven to ten days. The other thing was just personally — watching Happy Days as a kid and knowing that the actors from that show got to see me singing to them, that gave me a certain personal satisfaction I hadn’t experienced before.

t’s not the same as going to Comiccon and shaking an actor’s hand and saying, “Thank you so much for everything you did. You gave me a wonderful escape as a child.” This is different. This is my way of saying, “You gave me a performance — let me give you a performance back.”

There was another song, and this was Math Patrol. Math Patrol was a cartoon designed to help kids learn math. It was a Canadian television show that I grew up watching. When I first started the chorus, I remember thinking, “I would really love to do that song. It’s really obscure — anybody outside of Canada has probably never heard of it.” And somehow I was able to track down the person who wrote that song and produced that show.

I wrote to him saying, “Would you be okay if we did the Math Patrol song?” And he was very touched that, after so many years — we’re talking something like 40 years later — somebody was saying, “I remembered that project and I loved it. I remembered the theme song and I still sing it to this day.” Then he got a video of our group singing the Math Patrol theme song, and he said, “You guys just made my day.”

I’m not well enough to travel yet. As I mentioned, I’ve been working on my health for the last five years. I should be in a position to travel sometime in the next few months, and when I do, I might be able to go meet him in person and shake his hand and say thank you. That particular producer also reached out to the person who did the arrangement and all the sound editing and recording for Math Patrol. For that person, it was a moment of, “Wow — this is someone in the industry who inspired me as a kid, and now they’re reaching out to say, ‘Good job.'” There’s something really special when the people who inspire you have a meaningful connection to something you’ve done for them.

There were those kinds of moments. And being able to see myself singing on screen — don’t forget, I grew up in an environment where singing was discouraged. Whenever I tried to be part of a school play, it was considered a terrible thing in the house I grew up in. So I’m battling a lot of demons just to get to the point where I can watch myself on screen singing.

The other song was the DuckTales theme. I’m really happy with how that turned out. I reached out to a well-known barbershop quartet called Shopimus Prime, based in Ontario. I asked if my group could sing their arrangement of DuckTales, and they said, “Sure, this sounds great.” When we sent them the video, they said, “Hey, this is pretty good.” And I thought, “Oh, this is awesome.” Maybe one day I’ll sing with them.

I think one of the biggest singing moments for me wasn’t with my chorus — it was with the South Shore Saints Barbershop Chorus. We did a concert, and I had three months to learn something like 15 songs. I did it, and singing that night was so healing for me — just wonderfully healing.

Later that night, everything came together. There’s a barbershop quartet called Daily Special, and they sing a song called “This Frog” — a Kermit the Frog song. They performed at the same show, and afterward I approached them and said, “You guys sing ‘This Frog’ by Kermit the Frog, right? Would you sing it with me, and could we shoot a video of me singing with you?” They were very accommodating — a great bunch of guys, incredibly professional and beyond talented.

So we went into a hallway, and that was the first time I ever sang with them. I think I had about a month to practice the song in barbershop style — I basically watched a video of them and had to work from that. We did it in one take because I only had the one shot. And I sang “This Frog” with the Daily Special Barbershop Quartet.

Was it my absolute greatest performance? No. I look back at the recording now and think, “There are a couple of notes I could have done better.” Maybe with multiple takes and more time to practice together, I eventually would have nailed it. But the fact that I came that far and did it in one take with them — it was a lot of fun. That video is still up on my YouTube channel. These were all really meaningful things.

You know, my public last name is Kermit. I’m a big fan of Jim Henson and Kermit the Frog — I appreciate his qualities both as a creative character and as an administrator of creativity. So getting to sing that song on that particular night was, once again, a very healing experience. It wasn’t just fun. I healed from it.

Encore and KAG members in Encore chorus uniform

And it’s moments like that that I want to keep building and creating. With the singers I have now, most of them are very new to the chorus. For some of them, the Star Trek franchise gave a lot of hope because of the lives they’ve had. Being able to meet actors from the show and just say “thank you” means a great deal.

For some people joining the chorus, it’s simply because they love cosplaying and love the songs from the things they’re cosplaying. For others, it goes way deeper. There’s a place for everyone across that spectrum in my chorus, because we’re not singing typical choral repertoire. We’re not charging membership fees and performing traditional songs. We are singing songs that have very particular meaning to us, in an environment that we appreciate and are passionate about — and that changes the whole experience.

Senpai: Yeah, it sounds like your chorus has done so much more than it might appear on the surface. It sounds really rewarding and fulfilling. It’s kind of similar to cosplaying, actually — we always think our heroes are distant and far away, but the things we do are really relatable. When you sang to the people of your childhood and they felt it — that’s a similar process to cosplay. I’ve seen it where someone cosplays a character that a voice actor voiced, and the actor retweets it and is so happy.

Frank: It seems like something that’s fulfilling for most people is the sense that they’ve made a difference. We go through our lives feeling stuck in the same routine, dealing with the same conflicts.

But when a cosplayer connects with the performers and creative people behind what they’re trying to reflect, and those creators see that their work has made a legitimate difference in the lives of their fans — that is very fulfilling. And for cosplayers who put in so much unpaid, labor-of-love effort, being told by the very people who inspired them, “I’m touched by how much this means to you. I’m impressed by your work ethic. I’m completely blown away by how you’ve taken something I created and made it a part of your life and enriched yourself with it.” — That is also fulfillment.

There’s a difference between having fun and having fulfillment. If you want to have fun, go have fun. But fun on its own is not fulfillment. Fulfillment brings about a level of inner peace that fun alone can never provide. Fun is a distraction. Fulfillment is a way to heal and grow.

Senpai: I completely agree. As someone who’s organized cosplay events, I found them very fulfilling. It might seem simple on the surface, but I feel like I’ve genuinely changed people’s lives through those events — people made friendships, came out of their shells. It’s pretty similar to what you’ve done with the choir. Which leads me to my next question: what message would you like to leave someone who’s thinking about pursuing a chorus or exploring music for the first time?

Frank: Go for it. Short and sweet. Just go for it.

I’ve shared some of my experiences after my surgery for obesity recovery. After I had lost the weight, I had twenty pounds of hanging skin, and they removed it all in one surgery. Recovery has been brutal. There were moments where I almost didn’t make it. I was supposed to stay in the hospital for one night — they kept me for a week because it was too dangerous to send me home. The man in the room next to me died one night, and I watched his body being wheeled out the next afternoon.

That brought home the realization that we are all on borrowed time. During COVID, I didn’t get it until after I had already lost around 140 to 150 pounds. By then, my body was better able to handle it — because before, I was in the high-risk group. I was diabetic, obese, and I had asthma. By the time I actually got COVID, I had lost that weight, my diabetes was in remission, and I no longer had asthma. Even so, I barely survived COVID, and then I went through this surgery. The realization is clear: you don’t have forever.

We are all on borrowed time. Make the most of it. If there’s something you want to go out and do, just go do it. Nobody cares if you pass. Nobody cares if you fail. Nobody cares if you succeed. Just do it. If you want to try singing, try it. And if you’re not great at first — guess what? Everybody starts that way. If you want to cosplay and you buy a costume from a shop instead of making your own, who cares? Go do it. Have fun. Connect with people. We are all living on borrowed time.

And you mentioned doing the admin work to put together a cosplay event. Here’s something for people to consider: the most difficult parts of the work — whether it’s singing, cosplay, dating, losing weight, or getting healthy — are the parts that everyone else will take for granted. There is no pat on the back for all the extra work you do to fulfill your dreams.

When running a chorus, it’s easy for people to overlook the hours and hours of researching songs, writing out lyrics, making photocopies, overseeing contracts, getting everyone to sign releases, and handling every problem that comes up. You’ve organized cosplay events — you can’t tell me you haven’t had to deal with problem after problem, because somebody shows up and does something nobody anticipated. Somebody says something offensive. Someone behaves inappropriately. And it all falls into your lap as the admin.

And that’s the stuff the average person takes for granted. People don’t see the hours and hours it takes — the emotional toll, the mental exhaustion — and you’re not getting paid for this. You’re doing it on top of earning a living and trying to survive in this world. It can be a thankless job.

The same applies to when you’re trying to improve your dating life, learn to read social cues, or figure out how to eat healthy. You go to a restaurant and you just want to do what everyone else does — order combo number one. But you’re sitting there thinking, “Combo number one is not the best thing I could be eating right now.” And you have to scan the menu trying to find something that fits your nutritional needs. It’s an additional hassle that nobody else can fully appreciate, but you have to do it anyway.

If you want to cosplay, you have to do all of the admin work that nobody wants to do and that no one will thank you for, because they take it for granted. If you want to get healthy, you’re going to have to do a lot of things you don’t want to do — because people see the result and say, “Hey, you look great,” without seeing the hours and hours of work that went into it. If you want to get good at dating, people look at you and say, “Oh, you ended up in a fantastic, fulfilling relationship — you got lucky.” No. That person had to work on themselves to become the kind of person who can have, attract, and maintain that kind of relationship.

There’s nothing easy about any of it.

That’s why the people who are most successful also have to be the most passionate — because that passion is what carries you through the moments when you just don’t want to do what needs to be done, but you do it anyway because it’s a necessary step.

Senpai: I remember seeing a picture of a guy giving a big speech in front of everyone, and then another picture showing everything behind the scenes — all the pain and struggle that person had to go through to get to that point. People see the front, but they don’t see the back. Whether it’s chorus, cosplaying, events, or dating — there’s always going to be stuff that isn’t so pleasant. There’s no free lunch, so to speak. There are always going to be things that are unenjoyable, but it’s the fulfillment and the reward that makes it worth it.

Frank: That is exactly right. So to anybody listening: if there’s a character you want to cosplay, go for it. If there’s a song you want to try singing, go for it.

If there’s a health goal you want to achieve, go for it.

If there’s a relationship you’d love to be in or a love experience you’d like to have, go for it.

We are all on borrowed time.

You don’t have as much time as you think.

Make the most of it.

Encore Singing Chorus members in dress rehearsal

Senpai: I completely agree. I think that’s the best way to conclude this interview. Just before we go, I want to remind people that Frank will be at Montreal Comiccon. I believe it’s 3 days this year?

Yes, three days — Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. We’re performing on Friday from noon to 1:00 p.m. We’re performing Saturday and Sunday from 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m., before they open the doors.

And we’re doing a Klingon sing-along on Saturday afternoon at 4:30. We’re setting up a panel where I’ll be leading an auditorium of 300 people. We’re going to choose one of the more fun Klingon songs, and I’m going to take everybody through a sing-along. I haven’t figured out which song yet.

One of the Klingon songs we’re considering is the Dirge for Kor, dedicated to the actor who played the character Kor in both the original Star Trek series and Deep Space 9.

There’s also a Song of Victory from The Next Generation, the Warriors’ Anthem — which is always popular — and the drinking song, which might be the most popular Klingon song of all. Three hundred people in an auditorium, all singing a Klingon song together. So if you’re going to be at Montreal Comiccon on Saturday afternoon at 4:30, come join us for 45 minutes — it’s going to be a lot of fun. Really boisterous, really loud, and hopefully really memorable.

Senpai: Awesome. So if you’re going to Montreal Comiccon, mark your calendars. You’ve got to go!

Frank: And I would also like to ask everyone — if you’re interested in singing with us, there is still time to join our chorus. Please visit my website at encoreenceorencore.com — that’s encore three times dot com. Come out to a rehearsal, give me a call. I’m happy to audition you, I’m happy to try you out. It’s going to be, I hope, a truly powerful experience.

Senpai: I’ll leave that link below when this is posted on the cosplay blog. Is there anything else you’d like to say, Frank?

Frank: Just that I really appreciate the interview. You and I have known each other for years, and I’m very grateful that you’re giving me this exposure and this opportunity.

Senpai: Hey, anytime, Frank. I always enjoy talking to you — always love hearing your wisdom and what you have to say. It’s been a pleasure.