On St David’s Day, March 1st the choir performed its first concert of the year to a full house of about 140 at the Choir Hall. 62 choristers took the stage and together with the musical team of Siân Hatton, Shirley Anne James and accompanist John Nicholson a musical feast from around the world was presented to an enthusiastic audience. Introduced in Welsh by Shirley Anne James, including Welsh favourites for St David’s Day, the eighteen item programme, compèred by Siân Hatton, delighted everyone present and made the evening a great success.
Following the choir’s policy of assisting promising young musicians and singers, we were thrilled to host the first major concert for talented 15 year old soprano, Sophie White. Accompanied by Musical Director, Siân Hatton she followed the choir in part one by enchantingly singing Begeilio’r Gwenith Gwyn by Will Hopkins, Non so Piu by Mozart and Ich Liebe Dich, by Edward Greig, sung in English. Her second part presentations were Welsh Paradwys y Bardd written by Bradwen James and which unashamedly tells of the beauty of Wales, Stephen Sondheim’s Green Finch and Linnet Bird and finally the wonderful song He was Beautiful (Cavatina) the theme from the film ‘The Deer Hunter’ by Stanley Myers. Having chosen difficult pieces to sing, Sophie’s performance was all the more appreciated and applauded since she was clearly suffering the effects of a sore throat. A pupil at Brynmawr Comprehensive School, Sophie’s ambition is to become a professional singer and intends to study singing at University, hopefully the Royal Welsh School of Music and Drama. We are sure we will hear more of this brave and talented young lady.
Photographs by Colleen. Please left click on each image to enlarge
The concert was arranged to raise funds for the Teenage Cancer Trust in Cardiff. Anne and David Huxtable are representatives of the charity which is the only one in the UK dedicated to improving the quality of life and increasing the chances of survival for young people between the ages of 13 and 24 who have cancer. It should surprise you to learn that on average six young people are diagnosed with cancer every day. This charity relies entirely on donations and fund raising and Anne and David came along last year to enquire if we could perform a concert in aid of their charity. Their comments were that they really enjoyed listening to ’such a wonderful choir’. We are of course, delighted to have the opportunity to sing to help them. Having cancer is the worst experience in the world. Teenagers are supposed to be having fun with friends, enjoying life and looking forward to the future, but for many this is impossible. A Teenage Cancer Trust Unit provides optimum care through an innovative combination of design, equipment and facilities, specialist staff and culture. The aim is to provide teenagers and young people suffering the effects of cancer and its treatment with the experiences of as normal a life as possible. Please visit their web-site at www.teenagecancertrust.org to find out more. Organiser and charity fund raiser Anne Huxtable expressed her deepest appreciation to all who gave up their valuable time to ensure the concert was a huge success.
Tonight was also made special in that for six choristers, top tenors Peter Williams, John Antell and Stephen Edwards, 2nd tenors Russell Woodward and Lee Rees and Bass Paul Carlson it was their first time on stage. Well done all of you. Are you now looking forward to the Annual Concert on April 12th?
We are absolutely thrilled that a total of £1061 (yes! One thousand and sixty one pounds) was raised for the charity on the night. Many thanks must go to our musical team for assembling a wonderful programme (reproduced above), to choir chairman Mark Stocker for running the raffle and generally being master of ceremonies, Dave Kirton and all the staff behind the bar and Richie Llewellyn for passing the bucket around and exchanging a programme in return for a donation. A special thanks must also go out to our wonderful, faithful supporters for also ensuring the evening was a success and to everyone who set up the hall and cleaned up afterwards.