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[personal profile] gothams3rdrobin
So, the Born Free 'Wild And Live' concert at the Royal Albert Hall...

This was the event that basically kept me from getting another job for the last year. There was a feeling amongst a number of us that this was all just a pipe dream, and we'd never actually go, but then the day came and it was off to London, baby!

I'd had to put in a few hours extra at work that week, to cover the three rehearsals we had; two just with my own section on Tuesday and Thursday, and one with the whole choir on Friday. We also had a rehearsal on Thursday night, up in the canteen on the top floor - had to get my Dad to collect Rowan from Badgers for me, so I could attend that one.

It made last minute preparations difficult, but aside from train tickets home on the Sunday, I had everything I needed by the time I started packing Friday night. Tried desperately to get Rowan to go to sleep early Friday night, as we had to get up around five Saturday morning, but typically that didn't work. He's as bad as me for falling asleep, as neither of us can shut our brains down on command - that's why I stay up so late reading, just to knock myself out.

My alarm successfully went off at five am Saturday morning, and I dragged myself out of bed and began potching around getting last minute things done. Decided not to wake Rowan till six, then settled him down to eat some pop tarts for his breakfast while I showered. All our clothes were ready, and the bags were pretty much packed, so there was no need to rush. Got the sandwiches made for our lunch, and then off we headed to the bus, where we met up with the lovely Suzi. Got to the office in plenty of time for our departure at eight o'clock, which was a huge relief - my only real concern about the day was getting Rowan and myself on the coach in the morning. Everything else was in the lap of the Gods, I figured.

We spent part of the time on the coach rehearsing the Medley we were singing, and learning our part for the big Finale. Our composer, Dave, had been submitting arrangements for us to learn to Carmello Luggeri, the guy in charge of the finale, for months, but even though he'd made out Dave had carte blanche, he was never satisfied! *rolls eyes* So we threw together something simple as we travelled, and left it at that. By the time we hit Surrey, we were also randomly singing any songs that came into our heads - especially those of us down the front, who could hear Andrea, George and Dave discussing what songs we could sing in the future.

There was a lot of excitement as we pulled up to the Royal Albert Hall; a number of us had never even seen it other than in pictures, let alone gone inside. Mel and Will were supposed to be meeting me there and taking Rowan off to the Natural History Museum for the day, but they were unfortunately running late so he had to come in with me. Thankfully this was not a problem, and he was even given his very own Performers Pass! *grins* He came into the dressing room with us, and even sat in the front row while we were on stage doing our soundcheck. While there I had a couple of text messages from Will to let me know they'd arrived, but I was too afraid to check my phone incase I made the choir look unprofessional. Once George realised she told me not to be silly and check my phone! *laughs* So I was looking at it behind the back of the girl stood to my right - and there's a group picture up on Facebook taken at that exact moment! *facepalms* The stage manager even got Rowan to run an errand for him up to the Sound Desk, which was really sweet. He was as good as gold throughout, as he usually is for these things, though I did have to remind him to sit down a few times when he got restless.

We weren't the only ones doing the soundcheck during that particular hour, which led to a number of delays and a lot of 'hurry up and wait' for us; Robert Wells was messing around on the piano for quite some time, and quite a few of us were dancing along on the choir stalls to relieve the boredom.

Once we were done, we had some time to ourselves before we were needed back for rehearsals and stuff, so a group of us had already made plans to go to the local Pizza Hut for lunch. Mel and Will came along with us, and we just had enough time to eat before we had to make the long trek back to the Hall and Mel and Will took Rowan off to the museum.

It was an interesting afternoon; on returning to the Hall, we were walking backstage to the dressing room when we passed Rolf Harris in the corridor - having a chat with Peter Andre! I was walking right behind Suzi, who's a massive fan of Andre, when she just stopped right next to him! They noticed her and said hi, while I just kept on going back to the dressing room, giggling with Jo about how we were sooo not with Suzi! *laughs* Suzi swears she stopped to look through the doorway to backstage, but that's totally not what happened *grins* Jo and I told the others what had occured - which unfortunately prompted a number of the other girls to make a beeline for the backstage corridor to get a look at Andre... Andrea got a bollocking from the Born Free crew as this meant he was late for his own soundcheck... *rolls eyes*

Some of the choir members volunteered to assist Karen Hardy with her project to get the audience up and dancing when she and her Strictly Come Dancing celebrity-partner Mark Ramprakash had their fifteen minutes on stage, and this required them to have a quick Samba lesson. No way I was giving that a go, I don't have the hips for it! *laughs*

We also got to see Bryan Adams (do I really need a Wiki link for him? *winks*) do his soundcheck, though unfortunately we missed his actual performance as we had to line up backstage ready for the finale *pouts*

Later on, we were all called onstage for a rehearsal with Kiki Dee and Carmello to practise the Grande Finale - Carmello's arrangement of the famous 'Born Free' song. It's a beautiful arrangement, but oh man it's slow.... He's made it kinda folky, rather than the music hall ballad it originally was.

My childhood memories were forever soured during the rehearsal as, when we joined in the song, Rolf Harris turned around to look at us and did that old-man thing of 'admiring' the beautiful young ladies :-p Old men seem to think they're being cute and endearing when they do that, but honestly? It's just creepy.

On the whole, though, everyone was really really surprised at just how good we were! *grins* Guess they didn't think a bunch of call centre workers could perform at the Albert Hall, huh?

The problem with having a dressing room to ourselves was that we only had one dressing room. And we're a mixed choir. So we still ended up getting changed in the toilets, but did at least have plenty of room to make ourselves look presentable. Rachel was kind enough to straighten both mine and Jo's hair - Jo looked so different with her hair straight, as it's usually a mass of curls. Janet accidentally burned her cardigan on a pipe; this was actually slightly funny as it was during the period where all the girls were fussing with their hair appliances and we were all making comments that someone was possibly burning their hair! Good thing the cardie was spotted before an actual fire broke out!

Before we knew it, it was showtime and we were lining up in the corridor ready to go on stage. I was pretty excited, and very nervous, and when we walked on stage I didn't dare focus on anything other than Andrea. So I currently have no idea what the audience reaction was like afterwards, as I was in the front row and therefore one of the first offstage five minutes later. We were all really happy with how it went, and the mood was amazing in the dressing room afterwards. People were crying with happiness and relief!

We were smuggled into the auditorium a while later, to watch the rest of the first half. This was when I realised the major problem with the dress I'd bought specially for the gig; I'd lost enough weight in the last year to fit into it, but the front of it gapes open when I sit down! *facepalm* Damned good thing I was in matching undergarments! *wink*

We were up and boogie-ing with Karen and Mark, and sharing absolutely horrified glances when East 17 gave an incredibly ropey performance; they sang two of their hits 'Deep Deep Down' - which was completely out of tune - and 'Stay Another Day' - with no real harmonies or the signature "Stay now!" refrain. And Tony spent the entire performance stood there with his eyes closed and a hand to his ear as he sang - I'm sure that looks pretty cool in studio-based music videos when you've headphones on, but on stage? Completely pathetic....

I had no idea where Mel, Will and Rowan were till we headed backstage at the interval - their tickets were for the Upper Circle, so I was looking up there whenever I could (hadn't dared do so while on stage, even if I'd have had a chance of seeing them with all those lights on me!), but then when I got up to leave I saw Mel and Will waving at me from the seats just off to my right! They'd apparently been offered an upgrade on arrival, as not enough of the pricer tickets had sold. Excellent! Rowan was apparently dozing at that point, and I gather he did so for most of the show - good thing we were on in the first half hour!

We were sat up in the Gods for part two, when we saw Beverley Craven perform 'Promise Me', Gabriella Cilmi and Mutya Buena (who was apparently not very friendly with the choir members who encountered her) and several others. The whole thing was hosted by Martin Clunes, and we also had guest speakers like Helen Worth - Gail off Coronation Street, Anneka Rice and Rula Lenska.

The most notable performances were from Rolf Harris, who sang 'Sun Arise' and 'The Court of King Caractacus', and Peter Andre just before we had to head backstage. For all I may have a low opinion of Peter Andre, especially with all the stuff that's been going on between him and his 'supermodel' *cough*ugly*cough* wife Jordan, I have to say he was a consummate professional during his performance - his earpeices went on the fritz but, other than turning to face the wings and tapping his ear, he carried on as if nothing had happened. Never even missed a note. Can't fault him for that.

We then had to line up backstage for a while, preparing to go on to close the show. This was really tense as the choir was lined up along the corridor four lines deep and people were having to rush past us constantly. One of Andre's entourage managed to lose track of his toddler, who was later found by Anneka Rice! We were also constantly being shushed - you try keeping nearly a choir of nearly fifty people quiet, especially when Rolf Harris (who was not in his designated place in the line anyway!) was encouraging the girls of the soprano section to sing 'Two Little Boys' with him!

The finale went off beautifully, though I think Kiki had to cover for at least one guest star who fluffed his part. I can now honestly say I have performed on stage with Bryan Adams! \O/ Our part was basically repeating the refrain "Born Free, as free as the wind blows/Born Free, to follow your heart" ad infinitum; at a signal from Andrea, we carried on singing it while the main stars were taking their bows and filing off stage. This meant, of course, that the longer they took getting their famous arses off the stage, the longer we had to sing! Then, when Andrea was finally able to give us the signal to stop singing, I was horrified to realise that I had stopped singing a mere moment before! *facepalm* I was so tired and so worried about missing my cue that I bloody well pre-empted it! Damn! *laughs* And of course, being in the front row, there's every chance someone noticed.

Naturally the thing over-ran, so a number of the choir were panicking about the coach leaving without them. Andrea and George had been doing their best to reassure them it wouldn't, but once we were done there was an air of "Grab your stuff and go!" and they didn't have the chance to change out of their outfits.

Rowan and I were heading back to Aldershot with Mel and Will, so I had the luxury of enough extra time to get out of my dress and heels and back into my jeans. There was no way I was travelling across London in that dress and, while the heels hadn't hurt too much, I still wasn't leaving them on either. In retrospect, it might've been better if I had as the shoes I'd travelled in were also new and had been giving me sore feet too.

It was so late at night by this time that the Underground had closed, and we ended up walking for over half an hour before hailing a taxi to Victoria. We then had to wait about half an hour for the one o'clock train to Woking, where Will had left the car. Rowan was naturally tired and cranky, as was everyone else, and he dozed for the entire train journey and the subsequent car ride back to Aldershot. We took him straight up to Mel and Will's 'Spare 'Oom', where we were spending the night, and once he was in his pyjamas he was dead to the world till maybe nine o'clock? He thankfully spent the morning playing on the DS, so us adults were free to just veg and get over our exhaustion. Mel made us a very tasty risotto for lunch and we watched 'Lost In Space' and 'Back To The Future III' before heading back to Reading to get the train home. The train was still packed, but we did manage to find seats after a little while so it was fine.

It was one of the best experiences of my life, and I am so grateful to Mel and Will for helping me bring Rowan to see it, and for letting us crash with them overnight. It's lovely to spend time with them, even if we are too tired to do anything other than veg in front of the tv. *hugs them both*

Date: 2009-11-29 08:45 pm (UTC)
catwalksalone: happy grey cat surrounded by flowers (akt wat yay)
From: [personal profile] catwalksalone
Yay, you! That sounds like an amazing day.

Date: 2009-11-29 08:52 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] gothams3rdrobin.livejournal.com
It was! There's supposed to be a DVD being edited at the moment of the show - I can't wait to get hold of my copy! I can then hear how we sounded - which is something we rarely experience - and see how people reacted.

Date: 2009-11-30 12:22 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] alryssa.livejournal.com
Gosh, what a day! Go you! *hugs tight*

Date: 2009-11-30 12:36 am (UTC)
From: [identity profile] fair-witness.livejournal.com
That is too veryvery cool. Go, you! :)

Date: 2009-12-02 10:15 pm (UTC)
From: [identity profile] suchthefangirl.livejournal.com
Very awesome!

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