My New Favorite Extracurricular Activity

Fly Girl and I saw them perform a while back and I went home and looked them up. I found out that they take new members in the fall, and you don't have to audition (I wouldn't have bothered if you did). But with my previous work schedule I would have been unable to ever make it to rehearsal. As soon as I knew I was going to be changing hours, I went back and checked their schedule.

The season starts in September with open rehearsals. Anyone who's interested can show up and sit through rehearsal and find out more and see how they like it. If you like it, you keep showing up.

You can self-select what section you should be in, if you have any idea. I think usually the director evaluates folks in some way, but we started with a performance right away so the normal start to the season has been a little off. I'm an Alto 2. I dare say A2s have the most fun. We rock.

There are about 30-35 new people this year, in addition to the 60 or so returning members. Apparently this is an unusually large number of people.

So I'm having a ton of fun with it so far. It forces me to leave work and it completely takes my mind off work. It's very social. Everyone's so cool. I get chills listening to us. Already we've performed at Orchestra Hall and in a couple weeks we'll be the Westminster Town Hall Forum pre-show entertainment.

There's also a smaller group that will do some events where we've been requested but they don't want all 95 of us. I was a little nervous about trying out for that, but it was pretty much the same as joining the larger group. Whoever was interested showed up early one day, we sang a couple songs, our director decided we sounded good together and said if we were all interested, we were all in. Score! So I'm doing that, too. We might get to do a few holiday parties at the new Guthrie Theater! Eek!

A number of people have said to me, "I didn't know you were a singer." To which I say, "I wouldn't call myself a singer, but I sing." That's the great thing about a choir. Not everyone needs to be a vocal superstar for the group to sound fantastic. Most people have about the same amount of experience as I do, which is a few years of choir back in high school or college.

So this is where I'll be expending my extra energy. It's blissful.