Doin' the rounds

Suddenly I am recording choirs and this time it was massively different again.  This was Rhythm Syndicate, an SATB jazz-cum-pop choir singing their Christmas event at Wesley., so with some jazz tinged traditional hymns.  I'm not usually an Elton John fan, but I must say I was taken by two of his pieces, I'm still standing and Your song.  Maybe because for once I tried to take in the lyrics.  Pop is like that and it's why it's popular, I reckon.  It speaks to people about things that matter personally, or at least it can.  Otherwise, some older standards, Moonglow and a doo-wap take on Blue Moon, and Fire and rain, another soft-pop classic.  Then the Christmas tunes.  Amongst others was an arrangement of Away in a manger by Sally Greenaway and a quite chromatic and substitutional take on the first Noel by arranger Rhonda Polay.  That really impressed me.  And Somewhere in my memory, which is apparently lauded from Home alone but not one I knew, and a boisterous and lung-loss take on O Holy Night, such a glorious tune done with gusto and big sounds.  RS are an SATB choir of 12 women (one singing tenor, I think) and 9 men under Sarah Louise Owens with piano accompaniment from Harrison Whalen.  About as far as you scan get from Kompactus' contemporary classical and Oriana's Rach Vespers.  Doin' the choral rounds, I guess.  Jazz and pop structures with dynamics, sweetness, joy and occasional raucousness.

Rhythm Syndicate performed at Wesley under Sarah Louise Owens (musical director) accompanist with  Harrison Whalen (piano).