"The altos seem more... concerned..."

(... than the tenors, when it came to singing "Be merciful")

Fanny took tonight's rehearsal (no idea where Jamie was again, but Fanny had been scheduled for ages so it was obviously a long-standing commitment). It was nice to see her - it's been a while! In fact, it occurred to me the last time she took a rehearsal was (I think) the one back in January that inspired me to start this blog (here is the historic first post, in case you missed it) so I suggested to her, on my way out, that she might like to take a look :p

Geoffrey Owen (Hallé Head of Artistic Planning) came to speak to us at the start of the rehearsal to forewarn us about what we'll be doing next season. Lots of exciting stuff, but since I don't think it's been officially announced to the public yet, I'd better not mention it here until it has.

We rehearsed several large chunks of Gerontius (mainly the "Praise to the Holiest" section) and finished with a blast through Brindisi by way of contrast.

I'm afraid I'm falling asleep so any more entertaining remarks will have to wait till tomorrow! Sorry!