Annual review of a great night

On Tuesday I attended the 37th Annual Messiah Sing-Along & Play-Along at University Unitarian Church, the BEST Messiah sing-along ever. It's the best because they do they whole Messiah - every movement, note, repeat and da capo - and we, the people, get to do all of it. The arias, the recitatifs. Even the orchestra is volunteer. The only people who are arranged in advance are the conductor, harpsichordist, and a first chair for each string section. This year there was apparently "a near-riot" at the door, as tickets sold out much earlier than usual.

It's the populist Messiah, a musical barn-raising: a few people have a plan and know what they're doing, but other than that you work with whoever shows up. As a result, some things come off beautifully, while others are a bit dodgy. But that's all part of the fun.

Another part of the fun is meeting the people near you. My neighbor this year was a lovely, elegant woman, recently retired to Seattle from a a career of teaching music overseas to children of US military personnel. She had come to the sing-along the previous year by chance, and declared it to be one of the best musical events she had ever attended in a lifetime of musical events. Alongside the moments that are painfully off-key or off-tempo, she marvelled at the moments of improbable beauty, where "if you close your eyes you can imagine we're a great professional chorus, singing in a beautiful cathedral." That's exactly it, the addictive nature of this sing-along. And the beautiful moments aren't just the easy or well-known bits, either. Of course the Halleluja Chorus sounds great - it isn't very hard to sing. Sometimes a terribly difficult aria - written for one voice, not 100 - soars and flows so exquisitely it takes your breath away.

This year we had a lovely alto section, while the tenors were quite thin, oddly enough. The orchestra was huge, which is a mixed blessing. When you've got an orchestra of varied skill levels playing three hours of music that they've never rehearsed together, more people tend to be more ragged than fewer people. More wrong notes, poor tuning, early entrances. But that's not the point. This year? Three string basses, hauled out on a night of pouring rain! A trumpet player who also brought her cornet for the The Trumpet Shall Sound, really a rousing duet between bass and trumpet. Two people brought period instruments - crude, recorder-like ancestors to the clarinet and oboe. Damn hard to keep in tune, which added to the raggedness, but also to the fun. The conductor is a wonder, keeping us all moving.

Having recently shifted from soprano to alto and learned that harmony is HARD, I ordered a score back in November and have been practicing along to a CD. Boy, did that help a lot, although I learned that not all Messiah recordings are equal. The one Enrico checked out from the library somewhat at random was great, but when it had to go back, I bought my own, impetuously assuming that the London Philharmonic Orchestra would serve me well. Alas! Of the four major alto arias, they gave one away to the bass (But Who May Abide the Day of His Coming), truncated one down to a third of its full length (He Was Despise'd), and eliminated one entirely (the very lovely Thou Art Gone Up On High) - leaving only O Thou That Tellest Good Tidings to Zion unscathed. The tempi of the choruses alternate between Plodding Through Molasses and Bat Out of Hell (I forget the Italian terms - larghetto? prestissimo?). But I believe I've ordered one from Amazon that will fit the bill when it comes time to practice again next year.

(P.S. If anyone would like a two-CD set of the Messiah by the London Philharmonic Orchestra & Chorus - it's free to a good home!)