Following our trip to Mannheim we had a quiet few months before the busy Christmas period. However, this gave us the opportunity to have some additional rehearsals to learn some new items.
We started December by welcoming another new member, David Ambrose, who has joined the 1st tenor section. Congratulations David. We also arranged our next trip which will take us to Bruges in September 2013 and so far we have had 39 ‘deposits’.
We had an excellent Christmas lunch on Saturday 1st in ‘The Wig’, which was organised by Hefin Jones and Lawrence Sutton. The food was excellent and the afternoon coincided with the Wales – Australia rugby match. We ran a sweep for the final score which was won by Mrs Lynn Jones, wife of Walter. Unfortunately Wales lost by the narrowest of margins 14-12, but the mood was lightened when we were able to watch the end of the Swans’ match at Arsenal. The Swans won 2-0. This was the first time a social event of this type has been organised and, hopefully, will become an annual event. Thanks to Hefin, whose idea this was, and Lawrence, for ensuring that everything went smoothly.
On Tuesday 4th we sang at lunch time at Swansea University, once again organised by Les Carmichael, who also provided an excellent buffet after.
On Thursday 6th we performed at the Vivian Hall, Blackpill. This is now an annual event and the hall was packed. We were able to perform our new pieces ‘Santa Claus Is Coming To Town’ and ‘Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas’ along with others from our Christmas repertoire. We also sang a number of our usual items, but included ‘All You Need Is Love’, which we have only previously done at weddings. All the items were well received, with a bit of ‘audience participation’ in some!
On Friday 7th we sang at Clyne Golf Club for the Captain’s Charity and on Tuesday 11th we had our annual Ladies Christmas concert at the Scout Hut, Brynmill, organised by the Ladies Section. This took its usual format with the choir singing first, followed by refreshments. We then had a carol singing session to end the evening. Thanks to Linda Lewis, chairwoman, and all the ladies for organising the evening and providing excellent food and drink.
We did not practice on Tuesday 18th, but instead, a social evening was organised at the Commercial, Killay. Thanks to Gareth and Nova who provided a wonderful buffet and this was followed by an evening of impromptu singing.
We have a break from practice over the Christmas period, but we had a call from Dan Rodde on the Thursday before Christmas requesting us to sing at his wedding to Rachel Parnell in St Hillary’s, Killay, on New Year’s Eve at 11.30am! Apparently they had been let down at the last minute by another choir. Both Nick and Rhian were available and in true Gwalia fashion, a choir was assembled in no time. Although it was a ‘working’ day we managed to get 35 singers and both the bride and groom’s mothers thanked us after the wedding for helping out at such short notice and performing so well.
