The Sound of Christmas

A visit to the third annual Christmas Concert by Fatfield MSS alongside the National President of NODA and the Regional Councillor was a joy. A gentle festive warm introduction to the Christmas Season with festive offering in the interval of Christmas cake and Mince pies.

We were told before the start that at least three had succumbed to the (less than festive) winter bugs and were recovering at home. Despite their loss there were still almost thirty in the choir with the costume theme seemingly being the ubiquitous Christmas jumper, silly hats, elf ears and, in the case of one, a rubbish football shirt (sorry Norma couldn’t resist).

The concert was further themed into two halves with, prior to the interval, Festive songs (including one or two I was unfamiliar with but were nevertheless enjoyable); the post interval theme was traditional Christmas Carols and songs.

Led by Thomas Hindmarch who played the keyboard (very well) as well as directed from that very keyboard fetching in the singers and more importantly cutting them off cleanly and crisply. Well done to all for watching your MD.

Christmas is a time for youngsters and two shone within the concert with Cheiron Bates singing the boy soprano solo in ‘Walking in the Air’ (eat your heart out Aled Jones) and James Monaghan giving us a fine rendition of the poem ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas’

Everyone in the audience was ‘warmed up’ with a ‘Geordie’ version of ’12 Days of Christmas’ with the 5 Golden Rings being replaced by 5 Sausage Rolls having to be sung out lustily by the assembled audience.

The second act allowed us to wallow in the spirit of Christmas with traditional Carols with suitable Descant harmonies throughout – my all-time favourite carol being ‘Silent Night’ which was sung with emotion with solos by Kat, Lucy, Barbara and Adam.

Thanks to all that brought this festive feast to the region with me leaving ready for an egg nog – well done Fatfield – see you for ‘Barnum’ in the spring.

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