18 brave singers represented Delicious Sounds Choir at the St George’s Day celebration at The Hub, City College, organised by the inimitable Charlie Hislop. Unfortunately Charlie was ill, so the event was spontaneously hosted by John Denham and his two assistants.
Charlie wasn’t the only person off sick; a group of students who were due to perform extracts from ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ were also ill. This meant that we were asked to perform 40 minutes ahead of schedule…
Now, I’m all for spontaneity, but when a choir has had a single rehearsal, when there is only one of two basses on stage and he has spent all afternoon trying to learn the part and is understandably nervous, when I could only see about10 singers in the venue, I was reluctant to agree to an early performance. However, to my relief, the other 8 were spotted propping up the bar, and we began with an uplifting rendition of Ise Oluwa. At the last note faded away, the audience erupted into loud applause, and another singer appeared on stage, as if by magic! We then sang ‘Dance Me to the End of Love’ which pleased a big Leonard Cohen fan in the back row. Following the scrunchy chord at the end of this song, the second bass appeared in time for a gorgeous rendition of Moon River.
The audience joined in with Oh When the Saints and other gospel riffs.
Thankyou Eleanor for magicking up two or possibly three new choir members.
Well done everyone for committing yourselves to the performance in somewhat scary circumstances.
perhpas we could have a choir social at the Aspire restaurant at City College.. anyone fancy finding out more?