We had 15 singers at the Palo Alto local singing today: 4 tenors (2 men and 2 women), 3 trebles (2 men and 1 woman), 5 altos, and 3 basses. It was a nice mix of men and women, and a nice mix between the different parts (the altos weren’t as loud as you might expect, since two of the singers were quite new). Our sound really filled the small wood-lined room in which we sing.
At one point — I think it was right after we sang Mount Desert — someone pointed out the we kept choosing upbeat, joyous songs. I don’t know if it was the mix of the voices we had, or a shared mood, or what — but it was true: we sang 198 Green Street, 193 Huntington, 269 Bear Creek, 99 Gospel Trumpet, each joyful in its own way, so that I felt enveloped by the sound. Or maybe it was just the way we were singing today, for even 39 Detroit and 268 David’s Lamentation and 410 The Dying Californian sounded more joy-filled than I would have thought possible. We sang 122 All Is Well for someone who had died; that tune can be sung so that it’s a sad and mournful song, or it can be sung so that it’s a song of triumph, and today I thought it felt like the latter.
I came out of the singing in a fabulous mood.