Holiday gig season for the East Choralaires has been a long-standing Christmas tradition for many happy years. The 18-member choral group performs their seasonal repertoire in around 30 gigs this December. It's surely an exciting and busy time for the Choralaires, and I am lucky to be a part of it. I mean, we get to do what we love, wear pretty costumes, perform in halls and churches and schools all over town, but most of all, we get to grow together as an ensemble and become good friends.
The Choralaires are not only singers, but actors as well-- we play the part of lively, cheerful Victorian English carolers who love to sing to any available attentive audience. When we perform, we are acting-- and no matter the situation, whether you've had a bad day or we're all horribly out of tune-- we still must remain in character. No matter what.
Well, it was sure difficult to do that at one of our gigs the other night.
We performed at Bentleyville.
Not that that's a bad place to perform. On the contrary, it was a very fitting setting for holiday music. The only problem was that it was outdoors, and it was one of those evenings where the weather decided to change things up a bit and throw some nasty gusts of freezing wind our way. It was so cold.
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And of course, our costumes didn't keep us very warm: blouses, capes and skirts with no jackets, suits that didn't keep the wind out, hats and bonnets that were purely decorative. Combine that with the wind howling into the microphones drowning out our voices and you've got a great outdoor gig. Oh, yeah, and the wind kept blowing my bonnet off. That was so annoying... nobody else's bonnet was flying off, but naturally, it would happen to me.
Our teeth were chattering so much that we sounded like we had too much vibrato. Freezing and pained as we all were, we still had to keep up the cheerful English happy caroler faces. We had to continue acting-- that was the hardest part.
Interesting, though, was the fact that we sang with so much energy to drown out the wind in the microphones that we ended up singing, as a whole, much more in tune and synchronized.
Heedless of the wind and weather, the Choralaires stepped up, gritted their teeth, and performed with class-- even if we were shivering. Just like in the well-known Christmas carol, "Deck The Hall:"
"Fast away the old year passes,
Fa la la la la la la la la.
Hail the new ye lads and lasses,
Fa la la la la la la la la.
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Sing we joyous all together,
Fa la la la la la la la la la.
Heedless of the wind and weather,
Fa la la la la la la la la."
Merry Christmas, folks!
