Not literally (unlike singing tenor in Tallis’ ‘If ye love me’ a couple of weeks back, with its top Gs. But that wasn’t professional).
Two weekends ago (Pentecost, in the most relevant way of counting time for this context) I sang another service at St Matthew’s Bayswater, depping for their bass scholar Michael Rakoto. It’s good to keep my choral singing reasonably in practice.
The real departure, though, was last night’s engagement at Richmond Letcombe Regis, hopefully an entry for me into the retirement home performance circuit. If you follow the link and think it looks like the poshest retirement home you’ve ever seen, well, I’m with you there. The brief, for myself and pianist (and second violinist on one number) Rachel Greene, was 45 minutes, after early dinner, try and engage a rather reserved crowd but one that also know their stuff musically. The booker repeatedly described them as ‘a tough crowd’ and the atmosphere (and the acoustic!) in the restaurant space as ‘dry’.
Well the acoustic certainly was lacking in resonance and an electronic piano put through the PA and hearing loop system seems to have been a better solution for the audience than for Rachel hearing herself well. But I take issue with the tough crowd statement. A deliberately heterogeneous mix of classical ‘lollipops’, swing and Latin numbers, Irish fiddle tunes, an English traditional ballad and a number lifted from Les Misérables seemed to find something up most people’s street (I was complimented by a couple of Stéphane Grappelli fans afterwards, which is mostly flatteringly gratifying to my jazz violin skills). But my plan of attack had never been purely musical; it also involved (contrary to all expectations that if you hire a violinist, let alone a violin-piano duo, you’re getting a straight-up straight-laced classical recital) leaving Rachel behind the piano to do the hard work musically and follow the lead, while I engaged the less controversial aspects of my non-classical performance experience to work the crowd. My, let’s call it, physical expressiveness, wandering around the space (paying only the necessary attention to sheet music) and between-piece chatter to the audience certainly got their attention, and seem to have been rather enjoyed than otherwise. Energy was key to this I think – if you expect to be in the background you will be; if you act like there’s a spotlight on you, it’s amazing how many people will fall into line …
All in all, we had fun and as far as I can tell so did the audience. So, retirement homes, if your performances need a little spark bringing to them, you know who to call …
