My solo in the first half of the program.
The Les Mis, Spectacular was a Tideswell Male Voice Choir event at Gasworth Hall in Macclesfield. I was joined by several vocalist friends, and of course the marvellous male voice choir who had all perfected their choreography which engaged and entertained the audience throughout the show. Guests began to arrive from 2pm in the afternoon, I was surprised when they started pulling out gazebos, picnics including wine, one group even had a candelabra for the half time break! My family thought they were organised with an all-in-one box picnic table and benches, card/board games and some sandwiches. For the car enthusiasts amongst you the car in the photo below was a vintage Bugatti. Fortunately the rain held off even though there were dark grey clouds looming.
My favourite choir choreography was the opening piece ‘Look Down’ in the Les Mis’ section, which is a must see if you can make it to Stockport in Cheshire this October 5th, the Buxton Opera House on the 6th is already sold out. It was great fun to do some large ensemble pieces such as ‘One Voice’ which opened the show and ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ from Carousel with the whole cast. In the songbook I have the words are ‘keep your chin up high’ but I realised during the rehearsal that the choir use ‘hold your head up high’ so I nearly laughed whilst singing when my Mum, who’d bagged a front row seat, lifted her head up in her hands in the audience to remind me during the performance.
The concert started at 18:30 with a charming introduction and safety drill from the Gawsworth Hall host, Mr Tim Richards, we walked out to applause from the audience which feels great. I wore my silver sparkle dress for the occasion and first half. I sang a duet with Erin Alexander ‘For Good’ from Wicked, we’d had a run through at Erin’s and once more on the day it went really well and it was great to do some dramatised duet work. I was grateful to be given a solo slot and Dennis asked me to sing ‘O Mio Babbino Caro’ which I love.
In the second half I had been asked to sing Eponine’s role in the Les Miserable Spectacular, I performed ‘A Little Fall of Rain’ with Matthew who played Marius and Thernandier, it was indeed a fabulous show, which the audience enjoyed by foot stamping along in the finale and it was very rewarding to have a standing ovation when we finished with ‘Do You Hear the People Sing’ and ‘One Day More’.
The lighting organised by Martin, the sound managed by Kevin and the stage management by Steve were magnificent and they were a great trio of talent to work with.
Christopher Ellis was brilliant on piano, as always, and his piano solo was fabulous, although Dennis had forgotten his reading glasses and swapped my slot with Chris’ piano solo, which was hilarious for my family who all watched me taking the introductory praise for Chris until it dawned on me that he didn’t mean me and I turned back and sat back down looking like I was over-keen to sing! That gave them a proper good chuckle.
