The choir randautomne - Saturday

The choir has been back at work since the beginning of September. Many of the old stalwarts have left but a few new members have drifted in and out and are still deciding whether they will pay the annual membership fee, which has gone up to nearly 80 euros plus an extra 10 – 20 euros for music scores. The new committee members have been voted on and are now in their roles of treasurer, secretary etc I must admit that I have not paid yet. I was waiting to see if I would be unemployed as that would have been a much cheaper membership fee. I will have to get my chequebook out after the Toussaint holiday break.
Every year the committee organises a weekend away, so that we can all bond and get some extra choir practice in.
Since I joined in 2008, accommodation has been at a mountain centre about 40 minutes drive from where I live. This year was no exception and just like last year the number of people attending was not high, especially when you consider that kids and partners can come along too.
For the Saturday afternoon practice we had 23 people, plus the chef de choeur. We have about 60 members.
The number of people staying for the evening meal, bed and breakfast, dropped even further.
This did not deter those remaining behind from enjoying themselves however, and there was the added bonus that it was no problem to get a room all to oneself.
The main official entertainment of the evening was to be a showing of the DVD made from one of our performances of the fisherman and his wife, earlier this year.
Here (out of sequence), they are watching as the big paper fish rises from the depths to make the fisherman’s wife’s latest request come true.

Before this could take place however, there was singing to be done and there were new members present so an initiation ceremony would be needed.

Here is a video of part of a song which was led by J, who seems to be the official entertainment officer, a sort of redcoat with a blackberry on top.

In 2008 I had been the new member, so now it was my turn to enjoy watching it all from a distance. Basically it is like the minister’s cat game, only here an item is added to the shopping list each time and has to be accompanied by the appropriate actions. The sound quality is not good as the audience was enjoying itself too much.

All thoughts of the rain forecast for the walk on Sunday seemed to be forgotten. Helped of course by the whisky, wine, prune spirit, rikiki etc.