Accompanied by Westminster Chamber Orchestra Quartet

For this year’s Christmas concert, with some trepidation, we approached a classical piece – Vivaldi’s Gloria. Beautiful of course – could we do it justice?

Julie Aherne   https://musicdirectory.ism.org/people/Julie-Aherne-35969/ organised a professional string quartet from the Westminster Chamber Orchestra, so we needed to do a good job.  And we did!  It formed the first half of our concert and was very much enjoyed by our audience with the strings giving a full and rounded finish. We were also treated to some beautiful solos from our fantastic brave and talented choir members: Sue Campbell, Chris Chapman and Jean Anderson. Also a moving solo by our professional accompanist Camilla Jeppeson  https://www.camillasoprano.com/  is an outstanding professional singer.

We broke for refreshments and the raffle with some amazing hampers of goodies to be won. The second half was more light-hearted with contemporary festive songs and carols. Also an original solo by Debbie Jary ‘Yule’, a lilting lullaby ‘Bayushki Bayu’ sung by Paula Arnold, and a poem ‘Christmas Thank You’s’ ‘ Mick Gowar read by Pamela Rickard.

Our programme of songs, which were accompanied as much as possible by the strings, included ‘The Snow’, ‘White Christmas’, ‘It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas’ , ‘Little Saint Nick’ and ‘Winter Wonderland’, these together with several carols completed the afternoon which was thoroughly enjoyed by both audience and performers. The additional instruments gave a lift to many of the songs particularly ‘The Snow’ which was very beautiful.