Tuesday, December 4, 2007

The Jazz Singers Concert

Was on Tuesday at eight. We had an extra little rehearsal at 1:00 which was my lunch break and then a dress from 6:00-7:30 which meant I didn't really have dinner because percussion skills didn't end until 5:30 and oh. Tuesday was maybe a little bit hectic.

But the concert was good and I know that Jill recorded it so there should be a CD floating around of it eventually.

It was really cool actually- all night long I had people I didn't necessarily know or had only met once say "Hey, great job with jazz singers" which is incredibly heartening even if it feels rather undeserved.

The concert was full of gospel tunes complete with modulations up a tone for that special clouds-opening-sunshiny feeling. We also did a couple of rearrangements of Christmas carols with a decent sized orchestra which sounded lovely but meant that the choir were shoved into a corner on the side of the stage and we kept bumping into each other. I was on the far right side of the front row and because we are meant to be stepping side to side with the beat (which means inevitably the whole group moves a fair distance) meant that I ended up banging into the oboists stand. They were very nice about it though and the stand didn't fall over. So alls well that ends well.

We did a version of "O little town of Bethlehem" that Pete arranged with a thought to what Bethlehem is like today i.e, not terribly peaceful. He added a bridge to the song that took lyrics from a Palestinian poet and an Israeli poet. These are the lyrics that have been going through my head for the past three days nonstop:

"We must have faith, that cool waters will flow, peace will (??), and the flowers grow. We must have faith, to face the journey ahead, and not forget- what the poets said: The well shall not dry out, the river shall not stop running, as long as we are clouds, and our hopes are drops of rain."

Um. It's cooler with the tune. I need to figure out how to post audio files...

Anyhow- yay concert! My first performance at Guildhall, and it was totally fun.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

OK -- I'm confused: were you singing or playing the bass?

Casitareina said...

I was singing. Have I seriously not told you about this? I was singing because it is fun, and singing alto because I need to work on my ear and alto parts are never the melody, they are always the harmony which is what I need to work on hearing.