And then shall thy light shine forth as the morning breaketh.

You will be pleased (or not) to know that the prophets of Baal were disposed of last night, the fire descended from heaven, the thirsty land was laved, and apart from very sore feet and ankles, I survived the choir concert. Somehow, I’m not sure how, we packed the cathedral, echo-chamber acoustics and all, and got a standing ovation. One of our sometime choir members, who is also a sometime reader of this diary, was there and enthused on how amazing we sounded. I think that as a choir, this probably is the best we’ve ever done. It helped that we had a real orchestra and a real orchestral conductor to watch, not that Herr Doktor Professor doesn’t have a certain inimitable charisma. The feet, though, will be feeling it for a few days.

Even the party afterward was a success. My smoked salmon and rye bread (I had to slice it myself and it was like sawing through a brick) were much appreciated, and there was even a birthday cake that the soprano soloist (my nemesis) brought to celebrate her husband’s 40th birthday.

My only criticism is that the soloists were not up to my most elevated standards. The tenor was all right. The bass was often slightly under pitch and still mispronounced “Kishon”. My fellow Jews just rolled their eyes. The alto was a francophone whose English pronunciation was specious, but she had a beautiful voice. Our very own assistant choir director (my nemesis) did the soprano solo, and has not improved in my mind. She has a beautiful voice, but it is sterile. That’s all. When she tried to insert expression, as in the widow’s aria, it was a failure, because she just doesn’t have the depth to her sound.

There were a couple of places where a trio and a quartet of female voices were required and a couple of sopranos from the choir were used. I was at first a little miffed about this. Why wasn’t I asked? I’m a professional and the featured soloists are “professionals”, so? But the parents of one of the girls were in the audience, and seeing the look of delight and pride on their faces was worth it. So I really shouldn’t complain.

Enough about this subject. Today I get back to copying opera and extracting parts for the symphony piece.

|

<~~~ * ~~~>