Inflatable horn players, basses in drag, and remembering John MacMurray

All these photos are from tonight. (Again, bigger versions are here.) Sorry they're not very good, especially the ones of Cliff! And the zoomed-in one of the inflatable horn player shows the limitations of digital zoom :p

Last carol concert tonight, and it was the most fun yet. Even I was in a good mood by the end! (I was still ratty at the start, for which I apologise to anyone who spoke to me (particularly poor Sue-Ann, who had to speak to me several times and probably got several undeserved glares!)) There was lots of new silliness. I think the first bit was in Sir Christemas, where the tuba (I think) added a little unscripted chromatic run in the middle. But most of the changes were in the second half. There were rather more Santas (as in full costumed Santas, not just hats) than on previous occasions. But the best one was the horn player (I think it was Dicky - someone please correct me if I'm wrong) who waddled onstage in a huge inflatable Santa suit. (See blurred pictures above.) He could hardly walk, and had particular trouble negotiating the step up to his seat. Then he leaned forward to sort out his music and found he couldn't reach his stand. I've no idea how he managed to play his horn like that, but he did, although the suit was rather more deflated by the end!

We were also quite taken with the various Santa hats worn by the woman on the front desk of the 2nd violins. Yesterday she had a really cute Santa hat - cute because it was only about 3 inches tall! Today she had a normal-sized one, but it flipped from side to side at apparently random intervals (I presume it was battery-operated). Oh, and towards the end, while Gwenan Edwards was about to introduce the next item, the stage manager came on and told her something, and she announced that the timp player had had to go home ill, and could anyone in the audience step in? We knew nothing of this, and at first (before she asked for help from the audience) I think most of us thought it was genuine - I know I did! Needless to say, at this point Father Christmas ran in from the back of the stalls, and wandered across the stage dispensing presents to various people before producing some timp sticks and making a big show of tuning the timps before settling down to play the rest of the concert :-)

I think what most amused most of the choir, though, was Cliff (one of our basses), who came out for the second half dressed as an alto, in a proper Hallé ladies' frock, complete with windsock and huge dangly earrings! No idea whose frock he wore, or whether he actually sang the alto part :p

I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks of John MacMurray every time I hear Sleigh RIde, for it was always him that did the reindeer impression on his trumpet at the end. Tonight all three trumpeters did it together - maybe in memory of him. I like to think so, anyway :-)

Finally, if you've never heard of the NORAD Santa Tracking thing that the U.S. military do every year, and you have kids, you might want to take a look! Hint: if you read this after Christmas, you've missed it.... it starts at 4 a.m. (our time) on Christmas Eve.