A warm and appreciative audience filled the
baronial hall at the Ullet Road Unitarian Church on Friday, to
enjoy the Christmas Celebration hosted by Liverpool Voice.
The evening was entitled ‘Deck the Hall’ and this was the song that got
the evening off to a brisk start. The programme moved on to ‘Wassail’ which turned out be be quite a theme
for the first half. There were no less than three wassailing
songs in all, and a reading that explained the two wassailing
traditions - singing door to door round the village; and
blessing the apple trees with toast. In the Gloucestershire Wassail, a traditional carol collected by Vaughan Williams,
the verses were sung by three men in cloth caps enjoying the
odd swig of ale from a wassail tankard.
Before this there were some serious carols,
including the ‘Angel’s Carol’ by John Rutter, and one that was
possibly the high point of the evening, ‘The Snow’ by Edward
Elgar set to a poem by his wife Alice. For this piece,
definitely seasonal but not actually about Christmas, the
choir and piano accompanist were joined by three further
musicians on violin flute and cello. It added up to a rich
performance of a beautiful piece.
Ian & Lucy Gilchrist accompanied several
pieces throughout the evening, Ian swapping between the flute
and the double bass. As well as Sophia on violin for ‘The
Snow’, they were joined at points by Martin on the concertina,
and Trombone, and Elspeth on accordion.
The trombone made an appearance for ‘While
shepherds watched’ not to the traditional tune, but
‘Cranbrook’, a tune perhaps best known as ‘On Ilkley Moor bar
tat’. It was a lot of fun.
Other than verses sung by various choir
members, Andrea, Corrine, Erik, Jo, Lucas, Martin, Tim, and Brenda and
Jan later in the medley, there was just one solo piece, 'Babe of Bethlehem' sung by Kim Ford.
The first half was rounded off by the arrival of
Santa Claus, who regaled the audience with the twelve days of
Christmas, joined by the choir for just one line in each verse
- ‘Five Gold Rings’
Fortified by mulled wine and mince pies served
during the interval by Santa (Phil Waldron, the Unitarian
church minister) and his helpers, and warmed by the real fire
in the fire place, the audience took their seats for the
second half, which got off to a crisp start with ‘Ding Dong
Merrily on High’. Next came ‘Gaudete’ for which John McHugh,
the accompanist picked up his guitar.
The Conductor and Choir Artistic Director, Lesley
Bentley, introduced each piece, often with a brief description
of its origin and background.
Just as in the first half, there was a single
reading, this time an extract from a poem by Carol Ann Duffy about the
Christmas day truce between the trenches in World War One,
which introduced ‘Silent Night’ with the first verse sung, as
in the poem, in German.
The audience joined in towards the end of the
evening, with the Christmas songs medley, Jingle Bells, Winter
Wonderland and the like, and with O Come All Ye Faithful,
before the final number ‘We wish you a Merry Christmas’ - a
rousing ending to a wonderful evening.
Liverpool Voice rehearses on Thursday Evenings in
South Liverpool and the Artistic Director is Lesley Bentley,
formerly Director of Arts College at Notre Dame Catholic College for the Arts.
Choir members have a range of musical ability training and
experience, Rehearsals are friendly and purposeful. The choir
is always looking out for new members, although you may be
asked to delay joining shortly before a performance, or to
maintain a balance of voices. Currently here is a need for
tenors and basses. The contact details for potential members
or for performance enquiries is 07901349080 or info@liverpoolvoice.com
