This June 2019 has been a damp and moist month so far, so instead of watching the rain fall heavily this Thursday, we decided to let the sunshine in our rehearsal. The marvelous Linda Corcoran from the Great Western Chorus Of Bristol was invited along by MD Mary for the evening and she took us on a whirlwind journey to help us improve our latest new song. This is part of our scheme to ensure that we get a variety of experienced coaches to aid us and help bring in new ideas.

 The new uptempo is a cheeky barbershop chart and although there isn’t a plan for it to be taken to the convention this year, we realize the need to keep adding in fresh new material and rotating our repertoire. It helps us learn to implement the improving singing skills we are acquiring into everything we do.

 Linda got us on our feet with a vibrant warmup working our voices and concentrating our how we produce and place our voices. Then onto the work on the song. We sang in sections, duets and trios. We practiced how to add character to our performance and tell the story. As everyone had memorized their parts helped by the work that we had already put in during previous weeks to ensure we could already sing it together, it meant we could concentrate on how we come across rather than worrying about reading it (and not watching the conductor!)

 The evening remained on a constructive high throughout and everyone bounced out of the door at the end enthused by Linda’s energy and drive. We thank her very much for coming and giving us all an enjoyable evening.

 Roll on next week, when we will continue the good work. It can’t come quick enough!

Keep singing.

Mary (MD)