Archive

Thank you very much for your timely message of support. I printed it out and put it on display for all to see with the lovely collage of 'Damon photos through the ages' put together by David Harmer.
Yes, I think we all had a wonderful day, with lots of chat and reminiscing and singing and eating (lunch, tea and cakes, refreshments in the interval in church and the after-concert dinner)! - The concert (in the evening) felt good too and was well attended. The sun shone on us (in the afternoon), so that people managed to sit on the veranda to catch up with old friends in the very pleasant leafy surroundings of the Chesham Guide HQ - alias the Guide Hut - just five minutes' walk from St Mary's Church, our concert venue. For our Golden Anniversary Concert, we wore long, black, adorned with sequinned gold/black long scarves (they did look very special and earned many favourable comments) and the men of course, were gorgeous in DJs with gold bow ties!
We began with Wesley 'Blessed be the Lord and father' with a lovely soprano solo by one of our newest members, Elgar 'As torrents in summer', then a small group of us (plus a friend from Oxford) performed Sullivan 'O hush thee my baby', Rachmaninov 'Tyebye poyem', John Farmer 'Fair Phyllis I saw', and we heard organ solos by Alex Flood (now Dr MMus), finishing the first half with Finzi's challenging 'Lo the full and final sacrifice' also showcasing three lovely voices in solos. The second half was lighter in content, with Wood 'Full fathom five', Youmans 'Tea for two', Beattie's (one of us) arrangement for SSAATTTBB (!) of McHugh's 'A lovely way to spend an evening' and excellent performances of Richard Grylls 'The wine of love', Billy Joel 'And so it goes' and the traditional spiritual 'Down to the river', given by The Consort, a talented group of singers that grew out of the Damons and still (some of them) belong. This was followed by an astonishing combination of old and new: the Damons directed by Richard Grylls (one of our former conductors) in Richard Genee 'Italian Salad', with Will Dawes, our present MD, singing the baritone solo in true Italian operatic style and wearing a suitably OTT frilly shirt and HUGE red bow tie. Great fun was had by all! Finishing off the concert the 'assembled company' of old and new Damons under Will Dawes, plus Alex Flood on the organ, performed Parry 'I was glad'. What a fantastic, uplifting sound!

Will Dawes called all his predecessor 'Old' Damon Leaders in the group down to the front to join him in a special bow to the audience. A lovely touch.
We got home rather late after the less glamorous jobs of clearing up, washing up etc., but it was a lovely event to crown all the hard work of putting it together.

We didn't sing the Blue Bird (one of the Damon's favourite pieces years ago), alas, but Cleone got her solo in the Finzi.
Pity you missed the event! There isn't going to be another one like it! Look at the pictures!

Regards,
Uli