How low can you go?

Another week, another few hours rehearsing lovely Shakespeare music. I’m actually starting to feel a bit antsy. I’m not used to Oriana rehearsing music for only one concert at a time. Last year we had so many concerts and request performances packed into our schedule that we were rehearsing for several simultaneously, which was fun but a bit tense. So we’ve learned from the experience and have been all about forward-planning this term, building extra rehearsals into the schedule to allow us to rehearse concerts separately. I’m a bit worried that this means we’ll lose that enjoyable frisson of panic on the day of a concert, when we find a piece in the back of our folders that we haven’t rehearsed (like we did at last year’s Christmas concert). And there won’t be any chance that, come the performance, everyone will suddenly turn to a piece that I haven’t got, leaving me to mime with a strangled grin (last year’s Christmas concert again. That was an exciting concert!). It’s a brave but sensible new world.

It’s good to have the time to work on this Shakespeare programme though, as a lot of the music is pretty hard, with some gorgeous but tough dissonances. And of course, when you’re concentrating on trying to get the harmonies and rhythms right, pitch is the first thing to go. We were sliding like trombones on Wednesday. David-the-Conductor struggled between tactful encouragement and extreme exasperation as we plumbed the depths of our vocal ranges. The sops were giving the altos a run for their money with good strong chest voices, and the Basses were grumbling like drains. David-the-pianist joined in to correct us every time we dropped too far for comfort, and we all did sucking-a-lemon faces each time, but after the tenth occasion it just got dispiriting. Eventually, though, we got to a stage where we were getting the harmonies right, and it was starting to sound magical. “Yes!” shouted David-the-Conductor. “Lovely!” David-the-pianist’s fingers did some frantic flexing on the keyboard, but he managed to restrain himself from joining in, so we may even have been approximately in tune. So it’s starting to feel as though the programme’s coming together, and still three more rehearsals to go. I venture to say this bodes well, but I might just have jinxed us by saying that – we’ve got the Gardner still to rehearse after all. I can feel my tension headache building already.