Archive

‘Sweet Ads’ to sing next week at Westminster Church

December 1, 2016   ·   0 Comments

The Sweet Adelines Orangeville Chorus will be the first to perform at the newly renovated Westminster United Church coming up on Saturday, December 10.

Everyone is thrilled about the new look of the church interior, which was designed to accommodate such concerts and many other types of performances. Considerable attention has been paid to the acoustics and the layout both for its beauty and practicality.

Over the years, the church has been used and engaged for so many concerts and recitals, programs of many kinds using the space for its attractiveness and size that the decision to completely overhaul the interior of the church was finally taken, a leap of faith that, if the job was done right, people would come and pay to use it.

So, the Orangeville choristers  are thrilled to be presenting the first concert at Westminster.

Indeed, it is not simply a performance on the part of the Chorus, for they have included others: actors and musicians to fill the bill.

At the time of our interviewing Joan Borden, President of the Chorus, she said it was the 35th anniversary of the Orangeville  group that very day.

She was pleased to give us the lineup for the two performances scheduled for the 10th, matinee and evening times. “The male Barbershop Quartet, Super Tonic, are singing. Barbara Penker is doing a solo ringing the bells.”

Westminster’s organist, Nancy Sicsic, will be playing some jazz pieces with Dave Duncan and Kim Stevenson – a diversion from the sacred music that the organ usually intones in the sanctuary.

Then, the Chorus will sing their songs. The style of singing for those who do not know is a capella (no accompaniment) and still, in the manner of barbershop but with many more people. The chorus is all ladies and their music is whimsical, light, sometimes serious, tender – always wonderful.

Invited as a guest to the show is actor Roy Young, bringing a story to the stage along with two young actors, Wyatt Ellacott and Ella Barnhouse. They will tell a tale of family members who share a stack of old letters they have found, tied with a ribbon, and they blend this discovery in with the whole afternoon/evening of entertainment.

As this is actually an acting performance, it is being directed by Laurie Moore who is a teacher at Alton Public School, famous for its theatrical productions.

Wrapping the show is the young women’s chorus, called the Accapalusa, 11 “young girls, ages 11 to 18,” who participated in the Young Women’s Festival in  association with the Sweet Adelines, learning the ropes of chorus singing with all the harmony and none of the accompaniment.

Before we parted company, Mrs. Borden had a story for us. It happened when the Chorus had participated in the MEMORIES & MUSIC calendar, for which about 15 of them posed naked in the tradition established by the Calendar Girls of the U.K., were going to breakfast after their shoot. The April day had been cold and rainy and they were all ready for a warming breakfast.

They were lined up in one of the Highway 10 restaurants, famous for breakfast, when a gentleman came into the line up and worried about there being so many of them.

However, they consoled him by saying they were all one group. They explained what they had been doing – namely, posing naked in April outside, for this calendar which was promoting such a cause: music apparatus for people with dementia and Alzheimers.

They made short work of their numbers, ordering their breakfasts with efficiency and let him move on without too much delay.

When they were just about finished their meal, he came up to them to say: “I loved the story about the calendar and since I don’t live here, I can’t buy a calendar but I have bought all your breakfasts.”

The concerts with the Orangeville Chorus, Sweet Adelines and so many others are a matinee at 2:00 p.m. and the evening performance at 7:30.   

Tickets may be purchased at Westminster United, from any member of the Chorus and online: www.orangevillechorus.com


Readers Comments (0)





Please note: Comment moderation is enabled and may delay your comment. There is no need to resubmit your comment.