Gay Yuletidings
Back from a night out with best friends A and S. We went to 'Make the Yuletide Gay': an evening of singing and camp sheenanigans with the Brighton Gay Men's Chorus, starring, rather startlingly, Sandie Shaw. It was good fun - quite hilarious in some parts actually, especially the condensed singalong presentation of the Sound of Music, which the compere described as 'nun having fun on the run from the hun'. Two somewhat portly gentelemen pretending to be 16 year old Liesel and her 17 going on 18 would be boyfriend was visually just so striking as to provoke laughter from its sheer inconruency. At other times the laughter came from verbal adjustments to the familiar songs - 'Stand by your Man' for example rather marvelously performed by the whole chorus started with 'sometimes it's hard to be a gay man...' (tinsel clad by that point), not to mention the 'twelve gays of Christmas' (including 'six Gucci manbags, five nipple rings, four botox shots, three pink gins, two muscle men, and a Kylie Minogue CD').
Understandably there weren't so many female performers on the stage, but there were a few: one was a fabulous soprano and - talk about incongruity - sang 'Pie Jesu' with an almost uncanny purity towards the end; another was a kind of merger between Sue Pollard's Hi di Hi character and Margarita Pracatan (remember her? beloved of Clive James on an old chat show of his, mainly because she sang and played some dodgy electric keyboard with complete oblivion to her lack of musical talent). There was a kind of narrative thread by which the evening was organised - growing up gay, and the particular pleasures and pitfalls of Christmas - but it was lightly handled.Only one homophobic character was mentioned; an offstage uncle, to whom the chorus' riposte was a loud rendering of 'there ain't nothing like a dame'. The whole performance demonstrated a good deal of stamina all round I thought. It was odd how easily the songs and audience's responses oscillated between a slightly hushed reception of traditional Christmas carols, to rowdy joining in of the show tunes and occasional panto antics. But it seemed to work quite well. That's Yuletide for you.
If anything, I wished the chorus was stronger in terms of numbers. 50 is pretty good going for a men's choir but even so the volume would be much enhanced by even more voices. Also - there were one or two very nice male voices given some solo leeway, but it would still be nice to have some clearly talented and trained male soloists, like the guest female soprano, to add the finishing touches. Next year perhaps.
Not a lot else to report apart from I'm continuing to cram American poetry criticism in between shopping and household tasks - do you know I think I've finally got a handle on the intentional fallacy and the affective fallacy, after all these years. Though I don't think either should be dismissed in my appraisal of the BGMC above - they intended entertainment and succeeded: entertainment plus. Actually I confess I finished reading a chapter of poetry criticism in Starbucks this morning over a large mug of their divine dark cherry mocha. Perhaps prepping 21 lectures (for such is my mission) won't be so bad after all.
Understandably there weren't so many female performers on the stage, but there were a few: one was a fabulous soprano and - talk about incongruity - sang 'Pie Jesu' with an almost uncanny purity towards the end; another was a kind of merger between Sue Pollard's Hi di Hi character and Margarita Pracatan (remember her? beloved of Clive James on an old chat show of his, mainly because she sang and played some dodgy electric keyboard with complete oblivion to her lack of musical talent). There was a kind of narrative thread by which the evening was organised - growing up gay, and the particular pleasures and pitfalls of Christmas - but it was lightly handled.Only one homophobic character was mentioned; an offstage uncle, to whom the chorus' riposte was a loud rendering of 'there ain't nothing like a dame'. The whole performance demonstrated a good deal of stamina all round I thought. It was odd how easily the songs and audience's responses oscillated between a slightly hushed reception of traditional Christmas carols, to rowdy joining in of the show tunes and occasional panto antics. But it seemed to work quite well. That's Yuletide for you.
If anything, I wished the chorus was stronger in terms of numbers. 50 is pretty good going for a men's choir but even so the volume would be much enhanced by even more voices. Also - there were one or two very nice male voices given some solo leeway, but it would still be nice to have some clearly talented and trained male soloists, like the guest female soprano, to add the finishing touches. Next year perhaps.
Not a lot else to report apart from I'm continuing to cram American poetry criticism in between shopping and household tasks - do you know I think I've finally got a handle on the intentional fallacy and the affective fallacy, after all these years. Though I don't think either should be dismissed in my appraisal of the BGMC above - they intended entertainment and succeeded: entertainment plus. Actually I confess I finished reading a chapter of poetry criticism in Starbucks this morning over a large mug of their divine dark cherry mocha. Perhaps prepping 21 lectures (for such is my mission) won't be so bad after all.
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