Post #149 - Choir Reprise

Regular readers will be aware that, although I love to sing, maintaining a suitable place in any choir is difficult for me - I refer to these related posts:

General choir woes:

https://faspie.blogspot.com/2015/10/post-12-more-insomnia-choir-musings.html

What happened after the Easter 2017 concert: 

https://faspie.blogspot.com/2017/05/post-106-some-people-aint-got-no-sense.html

So, it's now 2019, I'm enjoying watching Glee on Amazon Prime Video and decide that it's time to get my voice out of storage.  I'm a fairly competent singer and with practice, I can improve.  So, I've heard about a singing group which meets on Monday lunchtimes and is located approximately 3.9 miles away from Chez Logic, and after a bit of finding out about what its all about from a member of my previous choir whom I'd recognised in a group shot, I contacted the Choir Director.  The Director was lovely and when I said that I had quite a lot of choir experience, was a tiny bit concerned that I may be pitching myself too low (not literally, although I am a soprano who often moonlights as an alto, so that might actually be true.) 

I went along, the church hall was located in the same road we once rented a flat in back in 2003 (that's one for the property fact fans amongst you.)  I arrived about ten minutes early, but the room was almost full, which is bizarre because in my other choir, people turned up late and it never started on time, but maybe that was because it took place between 19:30 and 21:30 and these people had jobs?  And lives.  The Choir Director was really friendly and welcoming and handed me a song sheet with lyrics on ... hmm, OK.  OK, please excuse me for being a bit of a musical snob here, but I do like to sing from a musical score as it makes working out the harmonies so much easier if you can see if the notes are going up or down for starters and whether they're crotchets, minims or triplets etc.  Also, the dynamics of a piece are totally lost without it - how would you know when to speed up, slow down or get louder? 

I did explain to the Choir Director that I had autism and it had affected me in earlier choirs.  She was duly sympathetic.  I squeezed myself into a soprano seat, as indicated, but nobody around me even said a simple "hello", in fact, the whole group seemed downright standoffish.  In my other choirs if I'd been sat next to a newbie I'd take the time to ask them their name, if they'd sung before and other such pleasantries (without sounding like a weirdo) - it's just good manners. 

Needless to say I won't be going back; it's great for people who just like to sing in a casual manner, but I like I said before, I want to improve.  Also the timing's all out of whack as the end of it coincides with school kicking out time, which as we all know is a nightmare on the roads and buses.