The generosity of the Artisans allowed us to still rehearse last night and, after navigating to the back door, we were all in place and ready to sing. Well, there was a musical chairs moment while Eamonn arranged us in our seats with some singers out of their comfort zone due to the constraints of the room.
The tongue twisters are still a challenge to some and the advice was; if you fall off, don’t give up!
If you only sing one word on the right note at the right time you will be able to build from that!
We completed The Windmills of Your Mind after first singing up to the point we reached last week.
It was not all bad. With a little tweaking we progressed through the rest of the song.
Although the Lady Tenors are mainly singing on one note (not an easy thing to do to keep it interesting and bright) they are the lynch pin to the song.
The “Keys that jingle in your pocket” section is sometimes sung in unison with everyone on the tune and then suddenly there are bursts of harmony making is sound wonderful. It might be worth marking your music score to highlight when you are singing the tune or the harmony, so you are prepared when the moment comes! Homework for Altos on this part.
We then reached the multi layered ending with the “circles that you find” sung by the different voices overlapping and interchanging giving a mysterious sounding ending. The sopranos wanted to slow down, but Eamonn told them, in no uncertain terms, that he slows down with the piano and we sing at the same pace! After a break for refreshments, we reconvened and sang The Windmills of Your Mind from the top to the end and completed the circle of our minds!
Circles of our minds at times seemed like, Ever Decreasing Circles of the mind. A blast from the past
Next came Make You Feel My Love a song written by Bob Dylan for his album Time Out of Mind, released in September 1997. It is one of the few songs to have achieved the status of becoming a "standard" in the 21st century, having been covered by more than 450 different artists. Cover versions have been recorded by Adele, Michael Bolton, Neil Diamond, Boy George, Bryan Ferry to name but a few.
Adele or Dylan! You decide?
Critic John Paul described it thus: "Accompanied by a lone piano, ghostlike bass line and slightly woozy sounding organ playing sustained notes throughout, the arrangement of the song isn’t terribly remarkable, the meat of the song itself relying on Dylan’s surprisingly emotional read and jazz-like chord progression".
Our Eamonn has arranged his own beautiful version of this song. However, he wants us to get the timing and rhythm right and not just to sing it like karaoke!
It is always a challenge singing a well-known song that we’ve all sung along to many times in our own way. We now have to unlearn that and conform to the notes that are written so we all sing as a choir.
The sopranos, who usually get the tune and the words and tend to struggle when Ooohs and harmonies are thrown into the mix. We were doing rather well with our Ooohs in this song and sang out boldly only to be told we are not the most important section and to sing quietly!
As usual, we all have plenty of homework to do. Keep on top of The Windmills of Your Mind, and do some work on Make You feel My Love and The Impossible Dream for next week, back at are usual venue.
Updated: Jan 21, 2023
To all our new members and old.
A blast from the past, Frost on Sunday
It was wonderful to hear these familiar words, “Good Evening”, from our returning Musical Director, Eamonn O’Dwyer, as well as being able to Trill on a Tuesday again after our long Christmas break.
Inevitably, we started with the excruciating tongue circles (for those of you who have not met Eamonn before, be warned - this happen every week!). This was followed by a warm up going up and down the scales and the evitable tongue twister about a chip shop in space that sells spaceship shaped chips!
We were gently led into A New Year Carol where we all sang the tune to give Eamonn an idea of how we sound now that our numbers have increased.
While we were going through this simple song, the new General Manager of Royal Mid Surrey Golf Club, Mark Gaily, came and introduced himself to us. However, he said he doesn’t have the voice to join us. I’m sure he’ll look in on us again and he will hear how we improve as the term progresses.
Monday, Monday. 2001. Not too sure about this version.
The next challenge was to sing Monday, Monday to Eamonn. He was very excited as he had arranged this piece, but has never heard us singing it. Well, we sang it from start to finish and was told that it was “not all bad!” Then it was broken down into individual voices and worked on.
The ‘Ba das’ need to sound like we are sequined backing singers with a bit of pizzaz and give the ‘Ohs and Ahs’ some ebb and flow.
The words need to be sharper – apparently, we sounded as if we were stoned! Having made these adjustments and singing it through again, we were not quite performance level, but was sounding ‘nifty’.
A new song, Windmills of your Mind was next on the agenda.
The song was introduced in the film The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), and won the Academy Award for Best Original Song.
In the original 1968 film The Thomas Crown Affair, the song is heard – sung by Noel Harrison – during opening credits and during the film, in a scene in which the character, Thomas Crown flies a glider at the glider airport in Salem, New Hampshire: having edited the rough cut for this scene using the Beatles track "Strawberry Fields Forever", producer/director Norman Jewison commissioned an original song be written for the glider scene which would reference the ambivalent feelings of Thomas Crown as he engages in a favourite pastime while experiencing the tension of preparing to commit a major robbery.
The lyric written was stream-of-consciousness as if the song had to be a mind trip of some kind – The title was a line at the end of a section. The song was restructured so that the line appeared again at the end. The thinking was liking it to when you try to fall asleep at night and you can't turn your brain off and thoughts and memories tumble.
Eamonn’s arrangement uses the quick flowing music in the piano part while the lyrics float gently over the top and overlap with the ends of the words extended on the consonant e.g. wheellllll with the emphasis on the ‘L’ rather that the ‘E’ and is the same for the other endings. You will see this is showing in the words in the music score.
Punch out the first notes on the phrases of the sensational lyrics to give contrast. It shouldn’t sound like Daleks - it should sound gorgeous!
Just in case someone has never heard a Dalek!!!
When singing ‘space’ keep it open with a smile and remember space is an open place😊. Think of apples floating around in space.
As usual, do your homework with the vocal parts in Dropbox. Go over your individual voice part and then practice what you’ve learned with the Full voice part.
PLEASE NOTE: Next Tuesday 24 Jan we will be rehearsing in the Artisan Clubhouse which is the wooden building on the right hand side as you enter the car park. Wear warm clothes!
A good start and a good evening!
For the first time In Flagrante performed to a sell out crowd
The songs were sung in harmony, the applause was loud and proud
Not an easy journey with many setbacks on the way
Covid, coughs and illness all threatened to spoil the day
Our regular pianist taken ill and cancelled the day before
Ricardo found a replacement; we couldn’t have asked for more
Most of us gathered early with a chicken tikka start
Then we worked our way through the programme to finalise each part
We practiced going in and out by walking two by two
Repeating it a second time so we all knew what to do
A break for tea and sandwiches and, for some, a glass of wine
Trying to calm our nervousness and hoping it would be fine
We walked in with purple folders and took up our places to sing
The room quiet with anticipation of what joy our choir would bring
We began with Monday, Monday and everyone smiled and clapped
The ending of the Carol of The Bells, well, we managed to adapt!
We all sung out with gusto, the dynamics were just right
Ricardo guided us carefully as long as we kept him in sight!
The first half ended rapturously with the wordy Rhythm of Life
Who would have thought it would go so well after all our struggle and strife?
A break with time to mingle with family, friends and all
Then back in place to sing again with a Finnish Reindeer Call
Now an opportunity for the audience to join and sing along
Getting in a festive mood and sing a Christmas song
After all the cheers and clapping and everyone wanting more
Another rendition of The Rhythm of life we sang as an encore
Against all the odds we triumphed; we did everybody proud
A great success for In Flagrante who entertained the crowd.