A musical day!

Saturday
We awoke this morning to the news of the devastating tornadoes which had swept through six states overnight and into the early hours, being particularly deadly in Kentucky, the state to the south of Ohio where we live, where it is believed at least 70 people lost their lives. In Mayfield Kentucky, which bore the brunt of the storm, a candle factory was destroyed, and being the Christmas season, they were working around the clock. Some managed to get out, but it is feared many perished. In Illinois, an Amazon warehouse was destroyed, with the loss of two lives. Having tornadoes in December is really unusual, they’re usually associated with Spring time. We had seen lightening when we were returning from the cinema last night, but around here it didn’t amount to much fortunately. Yesterday, we reached a high of around 65F (18C). Today, we had our high temperature at about 10am, and since then the temperature has been dropping, and tonight will fall to about 27F (-3C). We have a couple of “normal” days, then Thursday, we’re supposed to get up to 65F again! It’s like a Jack in the box!
Anyway, to the subject of my blip. Late this afternoon, we were down at Christ Church cathedral again, this time for a concert by members of YPCC, Young Professionals Choral Collective. It’s different to many choirs in that you don’t have to sign up to attend every concert or be at every rehearsal. Instead, they work in “cycles”, so you just sign up for as much involvement as you want, or your work allows. Laura has been singing with them since early November, and as it turns out, this will be her only appearance with them since she is leaving for her new job in Wisconsin immediately after Christmas. It was a fun, family friendly Christmas concert. The group also does a lot of singing in different locations in addition to their regular concerts, unfortunately Laura’s schedule has only permitted her to take part in this one event. After the concert, Laura was meeting up with a friend, and Roger and I went out to eat, before going on to our own church, for a recital by Eric, one of the “choral scholars” in our church choir. The choral scholars are usually students at the College Conservatory of Music, and are paid to attend rehearsal and sing with us on Sunday morning. We have one for each section. Eric has been with us for a number of years, and he was studying for his doctorate, and this recital was part of his requirements to graduate. He is a charming young African American, always well dressed, whether casual or formal, and with a tremendous baritone voice. Unfortunately there weren’t too many people there - his family lives in Texas, and he’d suggested they didn’t bother coming to this one, but to his final presentation and dissertation which will be in a few months time. So it was mainly people from the choir and other people from church, plus a few other people. I didn’t know any of the music, it was taken from different time periods, some was in English, some in German - there was a sheet with the words and translations. Most of it wasn’t particularly to my taste, but we were glad we had gone to support him, since these young people are such an asset to our relatively small choir, especially the men, which we are very short of! Our choir hasn’t been meeting since before the pandemic, as our director and his wife, who is also extremely musical, retired at he beginning of the summer, to spend more time with their grand children. We knew someone was being considered for the post - we were actually part of the first screening interview, but it’s been dragging on for a few weeks now. However, we heard tonight that he has been approved, and it is being announced in church tomorrow!