Fulstow, 15th May

1st tenors were a bit thin on the ground last night and Alan John was seconded back from baritones where he migrated to at the beginning of the choral year last September; he was able to pick up on most of the repertoire giving us 4 ½ top tenors including myself. It certainly keeps your wits about you but Graham said that we were not too bad considering, I think that was a compliment, but then again he is a very kind soul. We were at Fulstow and singing in aid of the Louth Navigation Trust raising money to restore the canal – there is an exhibition on its history before and after its creation in the 1770’s at the Louth Museum, go and have a look, as the museum do very good exhibitions on local issues, they had a very good one recently on the 1st World War. We were supported by Papillon, a Ladies sextet a

capella group making their first outing with a rich variation of styles who said they were very nervous and found it difficult following experienced ‘old hands’, they need not have feared, you would never have known it was their first time, it was all very accomplished and a good fit to what we were doing. No new pieces for us this time but Cantique de John Racine will be ready for our next. I took photos again including several of Papillon (including one of Brian Wood photobombing!) and one of two sets off deep in thought ‘wise monkeys’.

One of the Papillon group shots had an unwanted male in it, as far as I was concerned. However, when I asked who he was I was told he was Tom, the son of Gabriela, the lady on the far right. Tom who, I said. Tom from Collabro, the musical theatre boy band who won Britain’s Got Talent last year. There was some discussion as to what his surname is, Auriol, Graham’s wife, suggested I go and get his autograph so I could find out. The thought of a 64 year old groupie didn’t inspire me to do so, so I asked his step-father instead who said his surname is Leak but his stage name is Thomas J Redgrave; so there you go, a little trivia for you. Alan John was our MC and was making amusing links with last week’s election and he had a field day with nationalism with ‘Road to the Isles’, not to mention the Irish question with ‘Londonderry Air (Danny Boy)’ and the very patriotic sounding

‘Anthem’.

Our next concert is at St Botolph’s, Boston (The Stump) on Saturday 30^th May. We are all very much looking forward to it as the acoustics and setting is wonderful; we are going to be accompanied by Juliette Haley who was last year’s winner of our Young Musician of The Year competition, a very accomplished violinist who is going to be playing Brahms second violin concerto, a real treat. You really ought to come.