POHC Sings at Ronald McDonald House, Dec 21

It has become a tradition for a member of POHC to do a post-concert write-up. It started when our Sign-up Coordinator began emailing her summaries to the other members in order to entice newer members to sign-up to sing at community concerts held early in the season. It didn't take long for Concert Write-ups to become greatly anticipated amongst our members, so we share them here in hopes that you'll join us at a future concert. 

On my way to the Ronald McDonald House building on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, I noticed a guy with a nice hat carrying a drum. Could it be POHC Musical Facilitator, René? I sped up a little and said "Hello there!" He turned around with a serious look, but realized it was me, Wilfred!

We chatted until we got to the security desk where we had to use a registry computer to sign in (a bit confusing, but security helped us out). We thought we were all clear, but then Tenor Anthony, arrived and brought our temporary picture IDs that we had left downstairs with security..

The rest of the group arrived and we were a few minutes late starting our warm up. After we finished, we waited for more audience to show up, so we took a little rest until it was time to start the actual show. The audience was quite packed and then we were ready to begin.

Baritone Larry opened the show with his welcome speech as well as introduction of the song, Siyahamba. We followed with Jingle Bell Rock. Soprano Cheryl was in the group for this performance so we sang Hafinjan and started with her solo. Of course she was great, no question. We also sung Down By The Riverside while several members headed toward the audience shaking hands during the "I'm gonna shakes hands..." lyrics. Deck The Halls was next and we recevied a nice applause from the audience. We moved on to Imagine,  then This Land Is Your Land (only a few audience members sang along), and Peace Salaam Shalom. We had enough altos to sing 50 Kilowatt Tree, A La Nanita and Little Bitty Pretty One (the last song with with Alex, Nancy and myself singing solos). We all rocked the house! Then we finalized the performance with Give Us Hope and  our theme song, Let There Be Peace On Earth, with Larry and René doing the closing speeches. The audience really enjoyed the performance with one audience member sharing her positive thoughts on the performance after the show. Afterwards, everyone left very happy. Happy Holidays to all!

-Wilfred, Tenor Section Leader

POHC Visits Rivington House, Dec 18

 

It has become a tradition for a member of POHC to do a post-concert write-up. It started when our Sign-up Coordinator began emailing her summaries to the other members in order to entice newer members to sign-up to sing at community concerts held early in the season. It didn't take long for Concert Write-ups to become greatly anticipated amongst our members, so we share them here in hopes that you'll join us at a future concert. 

On Tuesday, December 18, POHC visited Rivington House on Manhattan's Lower East Side. After showing our photo IDs to security and receiving our bright red visitor stickers, we were instructed to press PH in the elevator. This brought us to the pent house on the fifth floor.  It consisted of two large rooms, one with chairs set up in rows and a grand piano covered with a red Christmas cloth, the other with physical therapy tables complete with pillows.  We stored our coats and bags near the PT tables, and Tenor Anthony’s mom put out the pizza-with-everything she had brought for us. 

 

Back in the first room we did our warm-ups as a few staff members made final adjustments to the chair arrangement and someone on the loud speaker announced a Hearts & Voices concert (meaning us) in the pent house. The residents--some using wheelchairs, others using canes, some walking without assistive devices--dribbled in as we were still running through a few bars of each song, deciding what to sing.  They took their seats and watched intently, so we explained that this was just the rehearsal.  It was fine with them—they seemed to like this taste of what was to come. One guy shouted out that he remembered us from last year. 

 

Five minutes later, we began the real performance.  As always, Siyahamba got us off to a rousing start. This audience loved everything we did.  They clapped.  They sang along.  When we got to the line "gonna-shake-hands-around-the-world" from Down By the Riverside, and were making our way through the audience, a woman said “Happy Holidays” to me while I was singing and shaking her hand.  René gave the audience instructions on how to join us for Little Bitty Pretty One, and they followed him to the letter, even to the softer and softer fade-out at the end.  When he gave the final cut-off, they did so exactly on time! Tenor Wilfred and Soprano Gwen did a great job on the solos--without microphones. 

 

Lily (former choir member, and the one who was the contact for this gig) slipped into the back of the audience while we were singing the third or fourth number.  So when we got to the closing song, Let There Be Peace On Earth, I invited her up to sing it with us.  A woman in the front row thought I was inviting her up, and she came to stand next to the altos. This woman hardly smiled throughout the concert, but clapped and sang along from her seat. Now, standing in front with us and facing the audience, she still didn’t smile, but she knew all the words and kept her eye on René and did everything she was supposed to do as a member of the choir. René caught her eye to let her know he knew she was up there and that he was including her.  After the applause, while we were still standing before the audience, she went back to her seat. Though she didn’t say anything, we could tell that this had given her a lot of pleasure. A nice reminder of how our mission to bring music to those in need includes allowing their voices (and hearts) to join with ours.

 

-POHC Alto