‘I was there’ is the title of a book by Mark Patyress that I was once given for Christmas. It documents past outstanding rock/pop concerts that people still talk about to this day.
On a much smaller scale, those are the terms I would use to describe a concert I attended last Saturday.
Now this wasn’t some rock extravaganza but the spring concert of Barclays House Choir, an amature choir that Margaret has been a member of since 2008. Of course I’ve attended all the bi-annual concerts that I could, but more out a sense of loyalty than music appreciation. My musical tastes are broad, but classical music is only lightly represented, and choral music hardly at all. In particular I find the hour-long requiems, which the choir always seems to chose for the spring concert, to be rather tedious.
Hearing that they were performing Mozart’s Requiem I wasn’t expecting much from the first half, especially as its sung in Latin and I had left my program, which provided a translation, at home. However the second part, a selection of opera classics was a revelation.
The choir at St Peter’s church, Parkstone, Poole taken at an earlier Christmas Concert.
Photo of the choir and orchestra just feet in front of me (taken with my phone).
A view a bit more to the right of the orchestra, I couldn’t photograph the orchestra any further to the left as I was so close that conductor Helen Brind obscured the view.
The soloists L-R Michael Dewis, Andrew Morris, Emily James and Caroline Thomas. Seated on the right is leader of the orchestra, Andrew Foot.
Opera, like choral music isn’t really my thing. I’ve only attended one or two operas and never listen to it at home. There are always one or two well known songs but these are islands in a sea of vocal extravaganza that I never understand at all, rather like listening to the Who’s famous rock-opera ‘Tommy’ and finding out that you really only like ‘Pinball Wizard’.
It was just these favourites that the choir, orchestra and four soloists performed; The Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves from Nabucco by Verdi; Pearl Fisher’s Duet from the Pearl Fishers by Bizet; Habanera and Toreador’s Song from Carmen by Bizet; The Flower Duet from Lakme by Leo Delibes, Brindisi from La Traviata by Verdi; Anvil Chorus from ll Trovatore also by Verdi and Nessum Dorma from Trunadot by Puccini. (It’s telling that I had to use Google to find out which opera each of the songs was from and who the composer was and in the case of Leo Delibes – I had never heard of the composer previously).
The Barclays House Choir and St Peter’s Orchestra are of course amateurs, the soloists however are professional, they were Caroline Thomas (soprano), Emily James (alto), Andrew Morris (tenor) and Michael Dewis (baritone). Between rehearsals and the concert Margaret brought Andrew Morris back for dinner (other choir members did the same for the other soloists) and so I spent dinner chatting to this outstanding singer quite unaware at the time just how outstanding he was.
Well what of the performances? All were superb but special mention has to be made of Michael Dewis’ Toreador’s song and the finale Andrew Morris’ rendition of Nessum Dorma which received a standing ovation.
The orchestra and choir also performed wonderfully, I was in the front row just feet from the orchestra and the soloists. I was so pleased to witness such a great concert that should have been performed in a concert hall rather than hidden away in a local church. Shamefully the orchestra and choir almost outnumbered the audience, it is a real pity that such talent is not appreciated more widely.
Perhaps this will spur me on to attend some operatic concerts, I’ve clearly been missing out.
On a different subject you might be wondering what has happened to my regular updates about my birding, ringing and foreign travel. Well the truth is I’ve done so much this year that I have literally thousands of photos that I have yet to look at, let alone edit, label and select for the blog. I do hope to get round to it some time!
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