Hiya folks,
It’s that time of the month again when I give you a massive
task of reading my goings on for the month haha 😊.
So, during this month it has been busy as it is the run up
to Christmas. I have had the joy of arranging parts for myself to play along
with in the ‘While Shepherds Watched’ concerts. I looked at Annie’s full score
arrangements and reduced it down to Flute, Clarinet…and Oboe…Yes, I have bought
an Oboe!!! I have started to learn the instrument and it is going well. I have
had the instrument for a couple of weeks, I still sound like a bit of a
duck…but that is to be expected and with practise, I will improve. It has given
me a challenge and motivation to learn something brand new.
I have been assisting Annie and Sylvia with the running of
choir, so Annie and I would take turns in taking soloists out, one of us would
take the soloist and the other run the choir, and then switching roles which
was good practise for me and has given me a bit more confidence in being in
front of lots of people giving the orders! I also assisted Sylvia on a Monday
night, by teaching a few of the numbers, conducting whilst Sylvia was on the
piano which worked really well and was good fun. We have done two out of the four concerts so far and they
have gone so well, the choir sound absolutely amazing, and as it is quite a
difficult musical, they have done brilliantly!
For these concerts I have done quite a lot of advertising
around the areas, emailing and messaging the churches in the surrounding area
so we get a good audience, and I have had good responses to the advertising and
churches putting the posters up and in their notice sheets at church, they have
been a blessing.
As well as doing the arranging for ‘While Shepherds
Watched’, I have done a transposition of ‘Is He Worthy’ by Andrew Peterson. If
you get a chance, go onto YouTube and have a listen, it is such a gorgeous
piece of music. Be ready to get goosebumps! I have written out the melody with
some rhythmic and melodic alterations with chords above to make it easier for
people to learn. At some point I would like to add in some of the choral
harmony as it is just stunning.
Coming up we have a ‘Torn Curtain’ relaunch in 2019 and for this I have had the task to listen to the tracks and compare it with
the score to see if there were any anomalies, it was like being back at A level
doing aural skills tests with having to transcribe something I’m listening to
and score the notes/rhythms down if they didn’t match. That was a task and a
half, it was good fun and got me working my aural skills brain again which was
good. I really enjoyed it actually! Quite looking forward to the relaunch, the
music is lovely and pieces that I haven’t heard for a long time.
In the office, as well as battling with Sibelius: getting it
installed, paid for and running was a massive task….5 hours later and I was
able to use it. As you may be able to tell…I am rubbish with technology. Roger
uses loads more tech than me, e.g. sorting diaries out, he’s on his phone and
I’m on my lovely paper diary…. I have been answering the phone more and taking
some orders which, I was very nervy about (The phone still makes me jump out of
my skin when it rings).
I have been working on making a promo video of
‘Pharisee’ for people to view if they are thinking about doing the musical and
it gives them a little taster of what the music looks like and seeing some stills
of the original cast in action.
On Friday night, we had a great time at Alison Fuggle’s
evening based around her new poetry book ‘With all the Trimmings’ and songs
which she wrote lyrics for. We had a brilliant team on for the evening, and
even though we didn’t get chance to have a rehearsal for the pieces, it went
very smoothly. The team are so talented and a joy to work with, I managed to
sight read flute music and transpose on sight looking at the clarinet part for
harmony and also sight-read the alto part for some chorus sections (of which I
haven’t seen for a while!) Good sight-reading test!!!
However outside of CMM I have been keeping myself very much
out of mischief, I am playing Flute 1 and Piccolo for The People’s Orchestra,
leading a Sunday school session, learning the Oboe, teaching the Saxophone,
looking around Universities for PGCE Courses for next year, volunteering at
foodbank and volunteering in school…
How I have managed to fit everything in is a miracle. School
is going brilliantly, they are using me in any way they can, helping me get
experience in every possible way to assist getting onto a course next year. The
children are just so wonderful, don’t get me wrong they do test patience every
now and again, but they make it up to us haha… it is such a joy to be working
with them and the teachers, they have been so, so helpful and kind to me. I
couldn’t have asked for better people to work with.
I also took the time to visit Huddersfield, assist in
‘Yeoman of the Guard’ by singing in the wings, got to catch up with some of my
brilliant friends, tutors and the community choir there and sorted out my
computer at uni… I do miss Huddersfield, but I’ll be a regular visitor.
So as far as I can think…that is pretty much my month summed
up into 1000 words… I’m nothing but consistent 😉.
God Bless you all xx
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