成人快手

So, Erlend and I have joined the chorus...the St. Magnus Festival Chorus!! **GULP** Well, I always say that life is never truly lived until you leap out of your comfort zone. We've done just that ~ and then some!

I trained to be an opera singer in Alaska and did one solo Italian Aria and messed it up with aplomb ~ sang off key because I was scared and because I was freaking about singing off key I totally lost my place halfway through! But I loved it just the same. Anyhoo, I left my training to marry my lovely Erlend and I haven't sung for nearly 2 and a half years... You can imagine the panic as I tried to warm up my rusty voice for the past week! Oddly enough whenever I howled my high notes Brodgar would start running around the house in a panic and Zeb would first run in to check that I was ok and then he'd run away and go hide. That did NOTHING for my confidance HAH!! Oh well. Honesty is the best policy...

We had our first practice last night in this gorgeous kirk in Kirkwall and my handsome farmer is a Tenor and I am a Mezzo-Soprano but there were no sign-up sheets for mezzos. (Uh oh...now what??) I spotted a lady standing with the sign-up sheets and I said to her, "Excuse me? Do you know anything about music?"

"Yes, I do!" she replied cheerfully.

"Oh thank goodness! I'm a mezzo-soprano...where do I go??" I wondered in a half-panic. (Please don't say sopranos Please don't say sopranos...)

"Well...the sopranos go very high, up to a high "A"..." the kind lady told me and I shook my head and waved my hands as if to ward off a devil. "Right." said She. "Why don't you go with the Altos?"

"YES THAT SOUNDS GREAT!" Said I and I dove off to the left and now I'm a mezzo in hiding with the Altos, just the way I like it!

Erlend was off with the Tenors and WOULDN'T you know it, he ended up sitting beside another farmer! These farmers kinda gravitate towards one another even in a big crowd.

So, practice started and I was totally lost. Never before in my life had I seen a score with uh...all the other scores mixed in! To my mortification the Lady to whom I had asked, "Do you know anything about music?" was our chorus director!!!!!! Er... That's just my kind of luck!

Thankfully I was sitting next to someone who had some idea of what was going on. Every two seconds I was asking, "Where are we?!" Suffice it to say, everyone else sounded spectacular and I resembled a howling cat. Halfway through I wanted to cry. At the end of practice both Erlend and I stared at one another with shell-shocked expressions and wondered if we were collectivly insane for thinking we can do this? YOU BET!!

Bwahahahahahahahaaa!

I'm already trying my best to hunt down a voice teacher so he/she can help me master my parts... (Anyone know of anyone in Dounby or Stromness or anyone that makes home visits for lessons?? ARRRG! I wish Orkney had The Yellow Pages...)