Choir was a lot of fun last night and there were a lot of chances to laugh. As good for the soul as singing is.
We started off with some very accessible warmups, practising different vowel sounds, but it always sounds mysterious to me when Kate says to Carol on the piano things like “B3 please Carol” or “A7 please Carol”.
Kate started the actual practice of songs with ‘Winter Wonderland’. It’s a well-known song but the verse at the beginning is less well-known than the rest of it and this is what we practiced first. It is so worth singing and listening to, as it conjures up a lovely picture of romance in the snow.
This was followed by ‘Star Carol’ and then ‘Mele Kalikimaka’, both led by Tom. We did a lot of repetition of different bars and lines, particularly with the section in ‘Star Carol’ that has lots of ‘Ah……’s in it. It was a relief when Katy decided that John Rutter (the composer) must have wanted his singers to breathe and we could breathe between each ‘Ah…’
The practice ended up with us all singing ‘Happy 100th Birthday’ to Eileen, while Brian recorded it. A great cheerful way to finish.
Written by Sue Bradley
