We are incredibly proud to have taken part in the choral festival at St. Augustine's in Hammersmith last Saturday.
It was quite funny how it all started. Our call time was 4:50pm for our sound check which started at 5pm. We put our game face on and tried our very loud singing and soft singing to check how the sound bounces in the church. Some adjustments needed to be made in terms of positioning, whether nearer the microphones or go down a couple of steps front. We were trying to fix the balance in terms of which voice needed more volume in some parts of our repertoire. Twenty minutes into our sound check, we were then told that actually, the mics were not turned on at all! The effect of positioning changes that affected the sound was more because the singers were further front of the stage or singing more loudly! Carmelo (the conductor of the other choir and the organiser) reassured us that the sound in the front is the same, it is only at the back that the sound is a little different.
The performance went rather well we think-- although there is always room for improvement as the cliché goes. We sang five pieces from our repertoire-- the French renaissance song Il est bel et bon, the Basque song Izar Ederrak, Manhattan Transfer's Java Jive, Freddie Aguilar's Anak and The Dawn's Iisang Bangka. It was good to practice singing the first three songs in public which are new for us, as they will be sung again as part of Haraya In Concert programme on the 2nd of June.
A huge variety of pieces were performed in the programme of the festival. A lot of them are popular songs and sacred pieces. Aside from enjoying ourselves watching the other choirs perform, it was also a great opportunity to learn from them too! Too bad we had another gig elsewhere straight after so we did not have time to enjoy and eat the lovely feast prepared for all of us and get to know members from other choirs better. Maybe next time.
Here are some unedited/filter-free pictures straight from our phones!