The last six months have seen big changes at choir. I suppose it really started before that – after Easter last year -when the venue moved from a place to which I could walk, to a hall about a 15 minute drive away. This is also a bit cold and bare and not as pleasant as the previous one. We moved as the first place was getting too small for the numbers. My major problem was that instead of a 10 minute stroll to the charity shop where I work in the afternoon, there was the drive back and then a 20 minute walk to the shop. Not very convenient, really…..
Then we were supposed to be learning the community version of the Messiah that Fiona had produced, ready for Christmas, but we did not seem to have enough time to learn it and I just was not getting it at all. I decided I really wasn’t enjoying the choir, so I decided to give it up, at least until after Christmas and the Messiah was over.
On the day that I had decided was to be my last one, Fiona didn’t come and we were given a message when we arrived, that she had been rushed into hospital. We heard later that she has serious heart problems. I gathered that the next few weeks her husband took some rehearsals and then that the Messiah was cancelled. The choir continued, with her husband leading or with someone else standing in and with Fiona doing one or two – or so I gathered. By Christmas, Fiona had decided she would have to give up the choirs, but she had found someone else to run them.
I heard that the new woman, Kate, leading the choir was good and was given her e-mail address, so e-mailed in the new year and was told it was fine to re-join. In fact it took me several weeks before I actually got there because of weather or others not going. When I did go, lots of people said they were pleased to see me, which was nice. It took me several weeks to catch up with what was going on.
Kate is very different from Fiona, but fun in a different way. She expects us to sing the right notes (!! not sure Fiona ever cared!) and seems to think we can read music a lot better than many of us can. She never tells jokes (probably a good thing – some of Fiona’s were pretty crude) and expects us to stick to the rests, come off notes at the right time and put expression and meaning into the words and even to smile! She is also talking about doing some choreography! She works us quite hard each week. It does mean, though, that we – well, I – have a much better idea of what we are doing than we/I did before. Her latest trick is to get us to sing some of the songs without the words/music – that is really pushing it, especially in the altos as we are few in number and half of us haven’t a clue!
So am I enjoying it? Not really sure – think I feel clearer about what I should be doing – even if I am failing to do it. And I have continued to go – not totally because I give someone else a lift.