By Lynn Bell, Lead

Here we are again at the Loddon Hall, Twyford to perform our Christmas Repertoire with The Waltham St Lawrence Silver Band.  Where did the last six months go from when we were performing here in the summer!

I love this particular Christmas singout it has such a warm feel to it and we are always made welcome by the band and the audience who consisted of Wendy Craig (the famous actress from way back when). A quick rehearsal squashed into the kitchen which doubled up for our dressing room and we were off to the risers for the first part of our show.

Our first song was ‘We Go Together’ which was a nice compliment to the band as we do in fact go together well. We were starting to get warmed up now.  Steve (my husband) thought that our singing was ‘exceptional’. He really enjoyed ‘The Boars Head Carol’, which is quite different from anything we had done before, being a 15th century medieval carol and our newest Christmas song called ‘Mary, Did You Know’ written in 1991 which sent shivers down his spine.

The band rounded up the first half of the show with a raucous rendition of ‘Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree’.

Emma, our MD, was our star on the top of the Christmas tree with her solo of ‘Walking In The Air from the Snowman’ accompanied by the band.  What a courageous performance.  She did an amazing job.

After a quick break back in the kitchen come dressing room we were back on for the second part.  We sang both our oldest and newest carols interspersed with our old favourites such as ‘White Christmas’ and ‘Jingle Bells’ which was sung with the band and the audience.

Talking of audience participation the ’12 Days of Christmas’ now has a whole new meaning!  Everyone joined in with certain sections of the audience taking on the various 12 parts.  The Partridge In A Pear Tree section were definitely the loudest by far. My team were 8 Maids A Milking – I’ll never be able to sing it again without killing myself laughing. Thanks Holly, Hazel and Marjorie!

We sparkled our way back onto  the risers in our new Christmas outfits and sang our last few songs.  I personally would have loved to sing some more but our time was up. We dismounted the risers to a wonderful round of applause and I’m sure you will all agree that it was the most enjoyable singout.

Looking forward to our next singout on Wednesday 18th at the Oracle and then our final Xmas singout at the Lexicon on Sunday 22nd.