Choral Chaos
Jun. 11th, 2025 08:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
melydiaWhew, so much happening on the music front. Friday the chorus had an honor flight at the Post. Saturday the quartet had one at the VFW. It was weirdly late - we were to show up at 7:45pm - so we got together a little early to practice. But on our way there we discovered texts from Mack, leading Beth to suspect she may have misread the time on the email - that is, 8:00 instead of 1800. Ah well. We arrived while Mack was giving his local history lesson, which taught us never to be late again, because omg that man can talk. In the meantime, we learned that these were the exact same people from the night before - which was good to know, since we'd planned on singing the exact same songs! So since it was so late, we only sang two: Billy-a-Dick and Armed Forces Medley. They were very appreciative, as usual. One lady even complimented me on my lovely alto voice, which was nice.
The day before someone had been doing a crossword puzzle and was looking for a 4-letter word for a woman's voice in a choir. Jason immediately said, "Bass!" I smiled and said it was probably alto, and later he was understandably a little confused: "You're a woman and you sing bass in a choir." So I explained how barbershop voicing works, and said in a regular choir I'd probably sing alto or tenor - but I would sound absolutely terrible attempting to sing tenor in women's barbershop!
Sunday the quartet had our gig in DC - the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) was celebrating 50 years at the Omni Shoreham. There are two kinds of gigs, I've found: ones where we come back glowing, all, "That's why we do this!" And then there are ones where we come back saying, "Well, we got paid." This, alas, was one of the latter. We were a quartet in an enormous ballroom full of people who really just wanted to talk to each other. I can count on one hand the number of people who actually acknowledged our presence. They didn't even turn off the music playing over the loudspeakers! Oh well. Coulda been worse.
Three gigs in three days is a lot, but my tyrant of a husband forced me to stay up way too late watching just one more episode of Ted Lasso. Monday was rough. When I got home from work I passed out on the bed with Zenith and Umbra for a couple hours, had a show script meeting, and then went to bed. The meeting went really well - Jason made a cameo to bring me dinner (homemade chicken gravy over rice - I am so spoiled) and had some really good ideas to contribute. He's going to play one of the contestants in our musical game show.
Last night the chorus had another honor flight, followed by rehearsal, both at the Post. There were some active duty guys there, which is unusual, and apparently one of them approached Claire afterwards to say he's stationed somewhere in this area, and is going to work with his commander to get an official military certificate of appreciation for the chorus. We've been doing honor flights for years, but this was a first. So that was pretty awesome. Someone else handed Claire a $20 tip - another first! And lastly, another really cool story from the evening: Sharon got to talking with one of the vets, who turned out not only to be from her hometown, but her dad and his dad lived across the street from each other as children and were best friends. Small world!
Then this afternoon the M-team got a bit of a shocking email from Claire: VF received another wildcard for internationals! If we go, it'll be next year, in Columbus, Ohio. Yay for driving distance! We hadn't expected to qualify, but it'd be a good opportunity to have a little comeback after last year's disappointment. I just hope we get new songs. I've gone to four contests in a row with those same two songs. I can't do it anymore.
In non-music news, today was the last day of school, so we went out for hibachi with the boys. Now all three boys (yes, the middle-aged one too) are upstairs happily gaming while I have some kate time in my study. I love my family so much, but I am just not cut out for the noise levels of parenthood. But instead of getting angry or annoyed, I just go elsewhere. That's literally what my study is for. I think sometimes Jason worries that I'm unhappy, but of course that's not remotely the case. I just need a place where I can go close the door. And, well, technically my study doesn't have a door, but it's quiet down here. I like it.
The day before someone had been doing a crossword puzzle and was looking for a 4-letter word for a woman's voice in a choir. Jason immediately said, "Bass!" I smiled and said it was probably alto, and later he was understandably a little confused: "You're a woman and you sing bass in a choir." So I explained how barbershop voicing works, and said in a regular choir I'd probably sing alto or tenor - but I would sound absolutely terrible attempting to sing tenor in women's barbershop!
Sunday the quartet had our gig in DC - the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO) was celebrating 50 years at the Omni Shoreham. There are two kinds of gigs, I've found: ones where we come back glowing, all, "That's why we do this!" And then there are ones where we come back saying, "Well, we got paid." This, alas, was one of the latter. We were a quartet in an enormous ballroom full of people who really just wanted to talk to each other. I can count on one hand the number of people who actually acknowledged our presence. They didn't even turn off the music playing over the loudspeakers! Oh well. Coulda been worse.
Three gigs in three days is a lot, but my tyrant of a husband forced me to stay up way too late watching just one more episode of Ted Lasso. Monday was rough. When I got home from work I passed out on the bed with Zenith and Umbra for a couple hours, had a show script meeting, and then went to bed. The meeting went really well - Jason made a cameo to bring me dinner (homemade chicken gravy over rice - I am so spoiled) and had some really good ideas to contribute. He's going to play one of the contestants in our musical game show.
Last night the chorus had another honor flight, followed by rehearsal, both at the Post. There were some active duty guys there, which is unusual, and apparently one of them approached Claire afterwards to say he's stationed somewhere in this area, and is going to work with his commander to get an official military certificate of appreciation for the chorus. We've been doing honor flights for years, but this was a first. So that was pretty awesome. Someone else handed Claire a $20 tip - another first! And lastly, another really cool story from the evening: Sharon got to talking with one of the vets, who turned out not only to be from her hometown, but her dad and his dad lived across the street from each other as children and were best friends. Small world!
Then this afternoon the M-team got a bit of a shocking email from Claire: VF received another wildcard for internationals! If we go, it'll be next year, in Columbus, Ohio. Yay for driving distance! We hadn't expected to qualify, but it'd be a good opportunity to have a little comeback after last year's disappointment. I just hope we get new songs. I've gone to four contests in a row with those same two songs. I can't do it anymore.
In non-music news, today was the last day of school, so we went out for hibachi with the boys. Now all three boys (yes, the middle-aged one too) are upstairs happily gaming while I have some kate time in my study. I love my family so much, but I am just not cut out for the noise levels of parenthood. But instead of getting angry or annoyed, I just go elsewhere. That's literally what my study is for. I think sometimes Jason worries that I'm unhappy, but of course that's not remotely the case. I just need a place where I can go close the door. And, well, technically my study doesn't have a door, but it's quiet down here. I like it.
