Saturday 18th May 2019, 10.30am – 5pm, Norbury Parish Church

Bob Chilcott:  A Little Jazz Mass and Ophelia, Caliban & Miranda

Under the musical direction of Ian Crawford as we spent the day learning and singing two jazz-inspired works by the master of contemporary choral music, Bob Chilcott.  (And Dan got to drive a Bentley.)
Singing days are a mixture of the intense and the informal.  We (the choir and anyone else who wants to have a go), spend the day rehearsing one or more works and perform a full sing-through at the end.  A hugely enjoyable day spent coming to grips with interesting and challenging musical works.  This time Ian led us through two works by Bob Chilcott  – “a contemporary hero of British Choral Music” (The Observer) – the Jazz Mass and Ophelia, Caliban, and Miranda.  Unusually for a group grounded in the traditional choral repertoire, we swung and we grooved.

The Timetable ran:-
10.30am  –   Registration and coffee
11am – 12.30pm  –  Rehearsal
12.30 – 1.30pm  –  LUNCH
1.30 – 3.30pm  –  Rehearsal
3.30 – 4pm  –  TEA
4.15  –  Final Sing Through

This is what it looked like:-

We were greeted at the door by friendly faces.

Steve, the society Librarian, supplied us with scores.

We assembled to study the music and text.

First attempts were captured in Ian’s thought bubble.

But with Dan driving the Bentley…

… and Ian explaining the minutiae, we improved rapidly.

Of course, it wasn’t all work (although the catering corps might argue that they were doing another sort of work).

The altos looked at the conductor and said “ooh”.

With the tenors watching his every move…

Ian encouraged the sopranos to groove…

which they did (in a slightly less physical way).

Finally, we all stood up for a full sing-through (and the photographer got to take a selfie).