Our previous Christmas outing to Stalham in 2019 had felt VERY Christmassy INDEED!!!
But in fully respecting our Covid19 secure environment,
we had to keep things appropriately low-key for our first venture into an auditorium since then.
Two years is a long time between events, so it seemed perfectly reasonable that our tentative return to singing
should only be for our invited family and host Church friends.
So if you normally support us, please don't think you have missed out on one of our concerts...
...there really was a restricted booking and invitation list on this occasion - unfortunately, the sign of the current times.

And we really need to start here by thanking our invited audience for helping us keep our Covid-safe environment,
for freely 'gelling up' and donning face coverings just to get in,
and for then patiently waiting in the outer foyer to be 'escorted' to their nominated suitably distanced seats within the Church.

Not our usual concert structure for this evening, since we delivered a shorter length performance.
This assured that the Church could remain adequately ventilated throughout
 and full audience separation maintained with neither refreshments nor a 'half-time' interval.
Also, the Choir could take a more expansive formation by fully utilising all 'stage' areas including the Organ platform.
In return, our merry band of singing men were in good voice and sang a selection
of our Christmas and seasonal songs with appropriate measure of volume, without having to belt it all out!

Our population of singers was roughly the same as before our enforced, but wise, lay-off -
we were blessed in that none of our number had been seriously affected by coronavirus.
Just a small number of our beloved friends called an end to their time with us over the interim period
and we have attracted a couple of new seasoned singers, who swelled our ranks again for this evening.

But we couldn't say the same about our usual professional musicians, unfortunately...
...sadly, our Musical Director, Sarah Grimes, wasn't able to take her usual place on the rostrum this time.
So we were lucky that our Choir Accompanist Jason Lambert
- a Musical Director by right with his own choir The Norwich Singers -
could lead our final rehearsals and then step up as Concert Director for our evening of song.
It was just as lucky was that our 'all points bulletin' for a Concert Accompanist put us in touch with Jane Everard, who,
with little notice of either our rehearsals (just 1 hour in one case...) or the concert programme,
ably supported our men in black from the grand piano as if she had been there all singing season.
So, 'Bravo Jason', 'Brava Jane', and thank you!!!
We, of course, sent our very best wishes to Sarah and hope to see her soon.

A shorter programme it might have been,
but there remained sufficient room on the evening for three solos from our talented ranks,
and a near-impromptu 'off the shelf' piano solo from our Concert Director!

Tenor 2 Jerry Elliott assured us that everyone was indeed looking for 'The Man with the Bag'
in a jazz-style we had not seen from him before,
whilst we welcomed Tenor 1 Peter Stevens to our soloist ranks for the first time
with a sound rendition of Cesar Franck's 'Panis Angelicus' ('Bread of Angels').
Jason returned to the keyboard for 'Ordinary Baby', one of his special Mark Hayes piano solos
(mmm...our Chairman's favourite musical arranger...so how did that one get into the running order???),
before evergreen top Tenor soloist George Utting gave us one of his very special renditions of
'Satchmo' Louis Armstrong's unforgettable melody, 'What a Wonderful World!'.

So that was the story of our special Audience with the Phoenix for our Family and Friends.
We delivered a good slice of Christmas repertoire,
wished everyone present 'A Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!' in song,
and ended with the rousing 'Sleigh Ride', accompanied by percussion from Choir Librarian, Philip Bourne.

Not a similar Christmas production to other years, but needs must.
To all our families, friends, supporters and everyone reading this who loves male voice song,
we wish you all a 'Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!'
and we hope to see you, Covid19 epidemic permitting, in 2022.