Some
of my more regular readers will have noticed that I've got a little behind
in this journal over the last couple of months. This has been due to an increase
of work together with other commitments of the Christmas period. One of these
commitments was The English Carol Choir.
My wife and I got invited to sing in this seasonal choir as we were know to sing by the people at the local church. The idea was simple, learn some carols and perform them at two traditional British carol concerts. In practice life is never that simple. To start with the carols were not all the traditional ones we are used to in the UK. Some were totally new and one was a traditional French carol in the original language, of course. So, every Wednesday night from the end of September onwards we have attended rehearsals with the rest of the choir.
The choir proved to be a mixture of English speaking expats together with a large group of Swiss people who either love singing or are passionate about the English or both. And the programme grew.First we were asked to supplement the choir at a local church as their pastor was leaving and some of the congregation were members of our choir as well, so additional songs to rehearse. Then we were invited to sing at an Ecumenical event as part of the Anglican contingent, so more to learn there too.
Some how it all went off well, the leaving event was a great success, the two services of lessons and carols were well attended and the ecumenical event even got us a review in the local papers. However it took up most of our free time in December and the first half of January and this combined with the chaos of Christmas has meant I've been trying to catch up ever since.
