A Busy Weekend - Saturday

Damn! I just typed out a whole blog post using this new Live Writer tool from Microsoft, and just as I was about to upload it, the whole thing got deleted! What follows is my frustrated abbreviated version, and please don't say that this should happen more often!

This weekend was the start of a lot of things, and I am now more tired coming out this end than I was going in. Saturday morning saw the Various Voices volunteer rally, basically a way for members of the choirs to get involved. I was doing a promotional spiel for the Frontrunners, so had to go there at 10am, give my talk, then rush back for the actual presentation at the Southbank Centre at 11am.

As I was a floater (a.k.a. odd job labourer) I started out with Roger (from Diversity) and Regis (from LGMC) at the welcome desk, before taking on my now-traditional role as photographer. I'll leave the actual description of the event to Hsien (what a great writer!) on the Team London blog, but will add that we had about 40 members show up, pretty good for a Saturday morning, and a good start.

There was hardly any time to breathe after that as the next event was at the Royal Albert Hall. Under the auspices of Sing London and with a chance to promote Various Voices we were going due to be part of a flash mob. Yes, I was thinking the same thing, what? The idea was that we were to infiltrate the queues at the last night of the Proms, start singing spontaneously, and get people to sing along as well.  As it turns out, the Union Jack clad members of the public were highly territorial and we decided it best not to risk assault by jumping the queue, even in pretence, and got together by the statue on the south side of the Hall.

The rehearsal prior to this was held at the Royal College of Music and led by the MDs of Diversity (singing) and LGMC (on the piano), and when we finally emerged into the sunlight we were raring to go. I've never seen so many weirdos (in the kindest possible sense) and I think they probably thought the same of us when we started with Take A Chance On Me. But the people around us gamely joined in, and by the time we got to Jerusalem the crowd was singing along with gusto, tongue firmly planted in cheek or not.

All too soon it was over. The audience wanted more, and we certainly could have sung a few more songs, but the time we were allocated was limited. There was, however, ample opportunity for the Pink Singers to be interviewed on camera by a member of Sing London, so keep an eye out for it on their website. Hooray for our fifteen seconds of internet fame.

After that it was off to the Poland club where Diversity bought us all a round of drinks. Thanks a bunch guys and gals! people often make out that there is competition between our three choirs, but the reality is that we all get along very well, and have such different niches that we really don't overlap much at all. It takes events like this to foster a closer relationship between us though, and I'm glad we were part of it.