Return of The Blogeteer

Ahoy there, me hearties! And how be’st thou after me long absence, I be wonderin’? I b’lieve Able Seaman Fardell kept things ship-shape while I was on shore-leave – no one asked her but I’m right glad someone took the ‘elm or oo knows where we’d be by now? Up a creek with the sails flappin’, I fear. Fer sartin you’d be less well informed than youm are thanks to ‘er efforts.

Enough. How are you ‘all’? I had a very good holiday, thank you, though the weather could have been better. I went down south where the sun used always to shine during July and August but where it does so no longer. Grrrr. Very disappointing. Extremely frustrating. However, great fun was had by all and I so shouldn’t complain, should I? Or should I? Methinks my advancing age entitles me to the status of ‘Grumpy Old(ish) Woman’; something one ought to take advantage of whenever possible. So, grrrrrrrrrrrrr.

I feel I missed a great deal of practise choir-wise, even though it was only two rehearsals. Especially as I returned to find that we are singing that tongue-twisting, tricksy little Spanish number (La Tricotea) TOMORROW in Princes Street Gardens and singing it pretty blinking fast, too. I have done my best to learn it well enough to slide and slur my way through it and if I manage to keep the panic from my eyes I might just get away with it. Apparently we will be doing it by heart in two weeks time in St Giles – ah, yes... what would life in Rudsambee be without a little pressure, a morsel of terror, to keep the spirit fighting fit?

Apart from this, Wednesday evening was pleasantly gentle – dare I say ‘laid back’? Should that be a worry 3 days before a concert? The most memorable comment of the night was Ollie saying something along the lines of, “That was really good... and it can only get better” which had us chortling (nervously) but which song he said it about escapes me completely, though I have a sneaking suspicion it was the Spanish blighter mentioned above. It would certainly be true.

We had all sorts of fun with ‘Monateng Kapele’ which is fun to sing anyway but which is much more interesting now – if only we remember what we practised in all the excitement of singing outdoors with microphones and a coming-and-going audience (that’s if there’s an audience at all). It may be pouring with rain. It may be stiflingly hot (and us in full concert dress of BLACK and red, too – but you should have seen the reaction from certain people when I suggested that a summer style should maybe be adopted in future - in the summer, of course... oh, lordy! It was a slightly mischievous suggestion, I must admit, as I well remember the painful deliberations which got us to the ‘costume’ we have now, but really! Other choirs manage to dress themselves without all this fuss – how hard can it be??????) – where was I?

Oh, yes, we have no idea what to expect but I have to say that my hopes of an event inventively entitled Scotland’s Got Talent are somewhat subdued. And from what I’ve heard the claim has, as yet, not been proven! Let’s hope enough people get past the title (and the big tent within which we are not singing but which is taking up a great deal of room in the area in which we are) for us to change that, to prove the point and to astonish the crowds with our virtuosity.

Now I must go and write some introductions to tomorrow’s songs – I am to deliver them all because I have used a microphone before. No one asked if I had done this with any success. It was assumed. And I allowed the assumption. So – God help me if I get it wrong!!!!

Wish me luck (or at the very least a mic that doesn’t swing around loose-headed like the last one I had to deal with during a play-reading at the Traverse a few months ago. You try emoting whilst chasing an errant instrument of amplification around with your mouth......)
xx