It's witchcraft!

Well, yesterday's Messiah was one of the most memorable yet, although not for musical reasons. I hasten to add that I don't mean to suggest it wasn't good musically - I thought it went very well, and the audience seemed to enjoy it. And so did I! It did have the one Messiah feature that I love the most, which is that the Hallelujah chorus was done properly, and just about the whole audience stood up without anyone patronisingly asking them to. Yay!

The soloists were great, too - all four of them. True, it was a countertenor instead of an alto AGAIN, but at least it was a very good one (Iestyn Davies - and I see from his website that he has several more Messiahs to do before Christmas). We also had Sarah Fox (soprano), Benjamin Hulett (tenor) and Derek Welton (baritone).

So why was it memorable OTHER than for the music? Several reasons. First of all, there was the whole falling-off-the-stage thing! This happened TWICE in two days... and it's possible that I might have CAUSED the second incident, with the power of my mind... On Friday, you see, when we rehearsed at the BBC, Margery fell off the stage just before the rehearsal started. I'm not sure exactly how, because I WASN'T ANYWHERE NEAR HER AT THE TIME (I just want to stress that, in view of what happened the next morning...) - I was actually walking into the hall with Dr Liz when the alarm was raised and people dashed out looking for Dr Liz. Luckily Margery was OK - she was just a bit sore, I think. She stayed for the rest of the rehearsal, but sadly didn't come to the concert.

The next morning, we had a rehearsal in the Bridgewater Hall. I was very excited when I saw the seating plan and realised that I'd been put on the end of a row. I absolutely LOVE being on the end of the row, so needless to say I hardly ever am! (Someone asked me at some point WHY I love it so much, and I couldn't give a definitive answer. But it's something to do with not feeling enclosed, I think. I hate crowds.) My excitement was short-lived, though, because Lindsey had a bad cough and wanted to sit on the end so that she could go out with less fuss if necessary. Of course I agreed, but in my head I couldn't help thinking "Oh well. But maybe her cough will get worse before tonight... or something else will happen that means she won't be here". Immediately I was horrified with myself for thinking this, but while I was still on the "I'm a bad person" thought, Lindsey only went and fell off the stage as well! And it was much more dramatic than Margery's fall, because Lindsey's chair went over the edge (she hadn't realised how little room there was, and I think she must have just moved her chair slightly until one side of it was balanced on nothing but air). She fell - with the chair - down three fairly steep steps, and hit the floor quite hard. And, alarmingly, there was quite a bit of blood spilled.

It wasn't as serious as it looked, thankfully, although it's probably just as well that Dr Liz and various other medical people were very near (actually, when Margery fell, even though she ASKED for Dr Liz, there were so many other concerned people gathered around when she arrived that she couldn't actually get near Margery!) Lindsey walked away - with help - and went to hospital to have stitches and checkups. But of course I felt INCREDIBLY guilty! I knew I hadn't really caused Lindsey to fall, but the timing of everything was just spooky. It all worked out for both of us, though, because she recovered in time to come and sing in the concert - and she insisted that I sit on the end. And I didn't fall off the stage \o/

If that had been the only incident, it would already have been the most memorable Messiah in years. But we had a huge surprise at the start of the concert. We were onstage, the orchestra had tuned up, the lights had dimmed slightly - we were just awaiting the conductor and soloists. But instead, our Music Director walked on. This was unprecedented, at a concert in which he wasn't involved. I wondered whether someone had died, or we'd just won some major award in the previous ten minutes, or something... but no. He hastened to reassure us that he was there only to bring good news - and he proceeded to make a lovely speech about Pat, one of our sopranos, who's been in the choir for FIFTY YEARS. He also gave her a commemorative brooch. It turned out that the concert was dedicated to her, and it said so in the front of the programme. Which explains why we weren't given programmes during the warmup as we usually are! Anyway, it was a lovely surprise, not least to Pat, who was as baffled as everyone else when he appeared. (The awards for long service are usually presented in orchestral rehearsals, but there's never been a fifty-year one before!)

Only a few links to share with you today, because I cleared my list on Friday.

There are still reviews appearing for the ENO Messiah, and the Independent actually has two - I think the first reviewer liked it rather more than the second one!

The New York Times has more information about the iPhone Orchestra I mentioned the other day.

From the Front of the Choir has a very interesting post about why basses get confused. It's not quite so relevant to basses who can read music, but several of the points he makes are valid whether they're reading music or not.

I found, quite by accident, a helpful page on the Manchester City Council website (I know! The shock!) which has details of all the Christmas attractions in the city centre.

And finally, I promised to list my most useful iPhone apps. I won't describe any of these in detail, because the links take you to iTunes pages that do that for me. However, if you want to ask me further questions about any of them, please do. (All of these are free, apart from two of them, which I'll indicate.)

My favourite iPhone apps

Music-related (in order of usefulness):

MiniPiano

Metronome

FourTrack (£5.99)

Shazam

SleighBells 3D

Santa's Sleigh Bells

Bravo Gustavo


Non-musical:

Air Sharing (£2.99)

Free Translator

thetrainline

Sudoku (Free)

Sky+


And, last but not least, the best one of all is part of the built-in software (i.e. you don't have to download it specially): Voice Memos. The recording quality (using the built-in mic) is unbelievable, and transferring the recording to your computer is no hassle at all - it does it automatically when you connect to iTunes. When I was voiceless in the last couple of rehearsals before The Kingdom, I recorded the orchestra and choir on my phone using this app, and emailed the results to a few choir friends (I don't have the recordings any longer, so don't ask me for them - it was just an experiment), and they were all rather impressed with the quality, given that it had been recorded on a phone. So, if you've been considering buying some recording equipment... just get an iPhone instead :-)