Christmas comes but once a year. Unless you’re in Oriana, in which case Christmas happens 3 times over a period of a month and a half. Yes indeed, having performed not one but two Christmas concerts in December, we are now rejecting the Gregorian calendar and all its works, and will be recording our Christmas CD in line with the Julian calendar Epiphany on the third weekend in January. Excellent! I always mistrusted that new-fangled Gregorian nonsense, and this will allow us to reach out to new audiences in such Julian calendar stalwarts as Ethiopia, the Ukraine and the Republic of Macedonia. After all, how can two million Macedonians be wrong?
The Christmas CD will be, as I understand it, pretty much a full replay of the Christmas concert, which I very much hope you attended. It was a smorgasbord of Christmassy delights, many of them original arrangements by our very own David-the-Conductor, all sung with a level of gusto that made me proud. Particular highlights were David’s arrangement of Star of Wonder (which frankly I am prepared to campaign hard to make Christmas Number One next year – it’s great!), and of course the marvellous Starlight (which I rave about in the blog every year so there’s nothing new there). Lowlight for me (apologies to the children’s choir and any other fans of this piece) was the Rainbow song. If you missed it, the song goes something like this:
“We’ll send you a rainbow for Christmas,
oooh, aaah,
a rainbow message of loveliness and joy and soft fluffy animals,
oooohh doo beeee doooh,
wear your knitted santa jumper from your grandma with a smile because Jesus loves you,
shooby doo wop,
together we’re a rainbow!”
To their credit the children’s choir sang marvellously (as did Oriana of course), and the song seemed to go down incredibly well with the audience, but frankly I could barely keep my head out of the sick bucket long enough to join in. Shudder.
But I’m not sure why I react so strongly to this piece, when Starlight (which to be fair, could also be considered “a bit naff”) is the very height of Christmassy joy for me. Isn’t it interesting that carolling “we’re reading a message by Starlight, and the message is love” makes me grin and caper, but singing “we’ll send you a rainbow for Christmas” makes me want to rupture my own vocal chords so as never to have to sing it again. I am the Scrooge of the rainbow song. Together, the rest of you may be a rainbow, but I am a little black cloud of grumpiness and I shed cold water on your message of burbling cheer.
Anyway, having to occasionally sing something that you hate does go with the territory in Oriana, and is a worthwhile price to pay for the chance to sing such a diverse range of music. And to prove it, we also had some superb and challenging choral pieces in the mix, which offset the froth enough for me to make it through the Rainbow Song alive. Leighton’s Nativitie in particular is a glorious and reflective piece of choral beauty, and while we weren’t quite perfect we certainly did justice to the mood of quiet awe. It sent shivers down my spine. Allain’s Christ’s Love Song, too, is a warm and shimmering piece of built-up harmonies and two-choir rivalry. (Choir one is the best! Nyah nyah nyah choir 2!) I’m really looking forward to doing them both the justice they deserve on the recording. And I hope all our stalwart Oriana fans will support us by: a) pledging to buy the CD; and b) keeping their decorations up until the CD recording is over. It’s still Christmas in the Ukraine everyone! Do it for global harmony!
Friday 30 December 2011
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