This is my favourite quote of tonight, and it's from the lovely Jonathan Scott. We all knew that he's (a) a fantastic pianist; (b) a fantastic organist; (c) very cute, particularly as he smiles ALL THE TIME. But until tonight I didn't realise that he had a website (go and look... some nice pictures, and a very full concert calendar, although it doesn't mention ours)... or that he's such a good stand-up comic! He kept it in reserve, too - he was fairly solemn when he introduced his pieces in the first half, but when he introduced the Elgar, the audience (and the choir!) was in tears of laughter by the time he actually played it :-)
Great concert tonight. Just about everything went really well (in particular, I'm pretty sure we stayed in tune all the way through - no mean feat!) The coming on worked brilliantly, which was a relief because I'd ended up being in charge of it. The going off was a bit of a muddle, partly because some people hadn't read Cathy's sheet of instructions but mainly because there was no chance to practise it, as this afternoon's rehearsal overran by 10 minutes. (I don't think Jamie realises quite how much bad feeling this creates, or he'd be more careful not to do it. It's very frustrating to have a great rehearsal, and get to the end of it with everyone thinking "this concert will be GREAT!" - and then spend 10 extra minutes removing that mood and replacing it with "well, now I'm not going to have time to do all the things I need to do before the concert! I'm sick of this happening every time!") But it wasn't so bad that the audience will have noticed, so no worries.
Only other tiny niggles - the 1st sops got very behind at one point in Laudibus in Sanctis, and only the fact that everyone else was watching (and stuck to the beat) prevented the thing falling apart. But it got back on track on the next page. Oh, and it was REALLY hot in the hall. So much so that I felt a bit dizzy at times. No doubt everyone else thought it was just the right temperature, though - I'm almost always too hot :p
Jamie seemed pretty pleased about the concert. He was certainly delighted in the rehearsals this afternoon and last night. A few Jamieisms (and quite a few John Wayne impressions, but they were all rather visual):
"Folks, you look like choral commuters!" (this was to the people who had their heads buried in their copies)
"The ee vowel is kind of like the Aga of your singing."
(To the 2nd altos, after we gasped in horror when he asked the tenors to help us on a low bit): "There's a lot of pride in your section. I admire it. Remember, I was one of you once. ... If you've got a new counter-tenor joke, I'd be glad to hear it!"
Anyway, we have two weeks off now! I must say I'm ready for a break (from everything, not just choir). Today was the first day in weeks that I haven't had a headache, and my blood pressure was measured again on Thursday and was higher than ever. And tomorrow is the first day in weeks I don't have to leave the house at all - I'm GREATLY looking forward to it! I haven't had a free evening since last Friday. Last weekend was all choir and Joseph, and this week has gone: Joseph, Joseph, Joseph, choir, choir, choir. Joseph was fabulous fun, though!
I've just realised I haven't mentioned my vocal assessment, which I came back to do on Thursday. I sang FANTASTICALLY... but only in the car and the practice room. Unfortunately as soon as I got in front of Jamie, things were less good. Although, I must say that his reaction to seeing me didn't help - there was no "Great to see you, Jocelyn - thanks for coming back after waiting for four and a half hours on Sunday!" What he actually said was "Oh. Just when we thought we'd made up some time!" So I didn't exactly feel welcome!
But anyway, my solo was OK. Sight reading was perfect (I'm pretty sure) note-wise, but my breathing had started to go by then and I was breathing far too often. (Breathing is my worst thing, but it's got much better over the last couple of years. But annoyingly there was no sign of this on Thursday!) By the time I got to the vocal exercises, I knew my breathing was terrible, and this of course made things worse. Nothing went disastrously wrong, but it was frustrating because I know I can do it so much better. (There have been a couple of times when I've managed to produce a sound for Maggie that's caused her to say "If you sing like that at your vocal assessment, Jamie will fall off his chair." Well, he stayed very definitely seated!)
I'm sure I've forgotten lots of things, but I'm falling asleep so I'll post again when I am thinking more clearly :-)
Saturday, April 08, 2006
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5 comments:
hi jocelyn,
just wanted to say that i thought the room was boiling too!!! the rncm probably heat it so much so they can sell lots of beer!!!!!! - shame we couldn't drink it though!!!!!!! :o)
Judith Newton had a friend at the concert, a direct descendant of William Byrd!
I wish to join the too hot club! I am also still seething at being told how to turn pages quietly!! I know I only joined recently but even I had managed to work that out on my own. I think some people forget we are adults. The concert was great fun better by a long way than in my dreams this last week!
I thought it was too hot too. Don't they have air conditioning in that place?
I know it's pretty obvious to most of us how to turn pages quietly but, believe me, there were people around me scraping their pages (even in small copies) across that daft bit of cord across the bottom of their folders.
Jackie
I'm fascinated by the William Byrd descendant thing. Judith tells me that she told Jamie, who was very keen to meet him, but she had to leave without finding out whether or not they'd spoken to each other (she'd suggested to her friend that he just go up to Jamie and introduce himself). Apparently he loved the concert though :-)
I must admit that the people round me were mostly turning pages very adequately before they were told how to, but then they're all 2nd altos :p But I quite like the thingy that holds the folders open - I find my hands ache far less than they used to.
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