28 November 2019

The baubles were up in reception tonight, about time too said no one. Ed startled everyone with his good evening.... he reminded us that next Wednesday is the Dorchester Christmas Concert and thanked people for bringing raffle prizes for that event. 

Dress code for the concerts is baubles out, if you want too. Looks very effective with black bottoms I believe. Both concerts start at 7pm. Please sit at the back and bring some lots of mince pies, or other sweet nibbles that people like. 

Then we ran through lots of songs .... ran being the operative word, apart from Carol Of The Bells when we slowed down to a somewhat sleazy speed and had to start again. The structure and the important things we will possibly forget were carefully spelled out as we went along. Please see the last two blogs for hints and tips and better jokes. 

We didn’t have time to run through songs twice but Ed read out a review including careful use of DONGS and encouraged people to make notes. So I tried. Please remember the air gap in tequila! Enjoy the breather, and follow Ed’s signals. 

Well done choir, it’s almost Christmas! I love you, keep singing xxx

21 November 2019

So .... Aaaaah ..... said Ed. And told us the running order for both concerts and is as printed in our booklets, apart from some very small changes. We chatted about raffles, mince pies, songs saved for encores, and why we weren’t singing in town, and we were off. 

Once In Royal David’s City sounded out all beautiful and unaccompanied and very festive. We sung versus one and four of this and also of O Come O Come Emmanuel as we appeared to be in a terrible hurry for an undisclosed reason. 

Carol Of The Bells sounded much better this week. It just makes me think of seasonal adverts. Ones with actual roasted turkeys on the table and not dragons. It’s an audience shocker, and one to come back later, before turfing out time. It’s quite good until the end when the Bells get a bit cracked and rusty. 

Good King Wenceslas looked badly spelled, but isn’t and tripped off our practices tongues as Ed stood to play more assertively his jolly keyboard... 

See Amid The Winter Snow revised the men’s parts first. It sort of disappeared so had a go at joining in too. And so did the rest of choir. Oops. But eventually is sounded PERFECT so we moved on to The Holly And The Ivy which is our favourite by far this festive season! This won’t leave a dry eye in the house. We also revisited this again right before bedtime, and Ed just listened, and some number twos went missing! Perhaps it might be ok if we practice during the concert too? 

A breath of fresh air, we were Walking In A Winter Wonderland and O Holy Night. Truly He tortoise. Be careful to leave out the slides. You will only slip on the ice and we should be heading carefully towards Hark The Herald Angels Sing. It surely will be alright on the night. Ed sang the descant part to demonstrate. 

O Come, All Ye Faithful will be all three verses on the night but we missed out the middle verse and all the descant singing was very lovely. Ed said very well done, and we had a rest singing Merry Christmas Everyone and Rocking Around The Christmas Tree! 

And a song that was a [sexy] solo for me last year, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas doesn’t give our choir too much trouble either. 

I’m Dreaming Of A White Christmas is really a lie because then the concert might be snowed off and we don’t want that. 

Those kazoos where whipped out for our surprise encore Tequila! Truly unmissable I hope someone records that little gem! A real Fairy Tale Of New York I’m sure. The men do really on this one, apart from when they steal the women’s parts! 

Well done DFS, stay warm and happy. Keep singing love Cat the Blogger xxx 

14 November 2019

So what do you want for Christmas? I’ll have a think about that. Ed arrived with apologies for leaving behind a folder of very important music behind. The night of Forgetfulness followed on from the night of Remembrance. 

The town council have asked us to perform on VE Day next year which will be on the may bank holiday weekend. On Saturday we said. That’s because we sang so well the other weekend and the town council noticed. And we are also invited to sing again at Sutton Poyntz street fare. 

We moved to Once In Royal for a warm up. I do miss a good Dum Dum Diddley ... the first verse is a Capella but needs to be a little more up tempo than it was. 

O Holy Night needs to be so precisely sung, with proper diction. Ed will be sharing recordings of harmonies some time soon so look out for those in his drop box. High note second time only, and when it is time for it, to for it in a big way! Spoonerisms are to be avoided at all costs at the end of the first line. Look it up if you have to, I’m not spelling out what was sung stage right.

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel was launched with Ed singing through the harmony and missing out breathing. It’s worth it though because it sounded lovely all played in the Key of David. Higgeldy piggeldy. 

Hark! How The Bells 🔔 still feels very complicated to us. I think I only know it because of swanky Christmas adverts on the telly. Some of us got lost in the words. The rooms split into ones and twos for our second run through. Then our choir master quit pounding the piano and announced that this song will actually be sung a Capella and we were delighted. Some wanted us to split into four parts but we declined...

Good King Wenceslas is all ours. That is, at the concert some songs will be available for the audience to sing too, but only some and not all, and there will be some song sheets available for them. This song however will be only for us to sing and is already concert ready!

See Amid The Winter Snow is short and sweet and with a big ending. There’s a nice low harmony for the men but they keep losing it under their seats! 

And then a discussion before singing that radical version of The Holly And The Ivy. We will definitely not allow audiences participation for this little gem. 

Walking In A Winter Wonderland was a walk in a very easy place after that last song. 

Our choir master promised us descants for Hark The Herald and O Come, All Ye Faithful  broke them down very nicely. The congregation will love joinig in and help cover up all our bum notes ...

DFS be proud. You are amazing. I love you! Cat xxx 

7 November 2019

Merry Christmas! We all collected some lovely Christmas themed song booklet. Ed gave DFS his greatful thanks for everyone who came along on Sunday and shared some photos from the event itself. Forms will be available next week to buy a copy of the DVD, which is also the deadline. 

In concert news, our venue has been confirmed as the church here at St Aldhelms, 12 December, and is a lovely venue and I will make sure has a plug in the church newsletter, if it’s ok with the big man. Ed I mean, not God. We don’t have many concerts this year but are due to sing carols on the 14 December at Shire Hall Museum. I hope we can sing in the court room that would be fun. 

We whipped out out the brand new song books ...

We began our singing with Once In Royal David’s City. A capele for the first verse only. Please do sing any descant parts if you know them. 

O Holy Night. Don’t go too high the first time. We of course needed a reminder. Also don’t go a bit Millward on ‘O night Devine’ and stay sober. Good. 

O Come, O Come, Emmanuel is not such a well known him. Tiësto Picardy. 

Then things got complicated with Hark How The Bells and that was before we added in any other parts! And when we did... being mindful that the Dings and Dongs were all in the right place on our lyrics sheets. The room split into sides. 

Good King Wenceslas through the rude winds wild lament went we! See Amid The Winter Snow featured a nice new part for men. And a warning to sing in tune! 

There is another version of The Holly And The Ivy which has a different tune and is actually a round. Choir thought our choir master had made it up. Yehaw. Two, three and then four overlapping parts were attempted. Hmmmmm. It took some work but we sort of got there before trying to sing Walking Round In Womens Underwear. Wait. That’s seasonal shopping in Debenhams. I’m really getting into the spirit now. 

Fine. Hark The Herald with descants welcome, so O Come All Ye Faithful. All good, so we fast forward to page 14, Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas which I just remembered I did as a solo last year. All sultry like. Pass me a sherry darling..... 

We finished on a fun note with Fairy Tale Of New York split into male a female parts. Maybe I should rephrase that. Perfect. 

And keep singing. You got this! Please bring your kazoos next week for some more festive fun. Love, Cat xxx 

Ps how about this https://youtu.be/ETe6jOt6BnI

Weymouth Festival of Remembrance

As you may know, the blogger was not free to attend this very important event, but I am so Proud of you that I’ve found a way to blog about it anyway! 

Our dear choir master had this to share after the event, “Thank you so much to all who came along tonight and joined in a beautiful concert of remembrance for our fallen soldiers and their families. You sang with every ounce of passion, respect and honour and I am so proud to be your director. This is everything Dorset for Singing was created for, thank you again xx.”

This wonderful photo of you all shining was taken by Graham Hunt Photography and is shared with kind permission of Weymouth Festival of Remembrance. 

Well done DFS and see you Thursday xxx