Then like a couple weeks later a friend that moved here from Berlin messages me if I know any amateur choirs around cuz she used to sing in a choir twenty years ago and feels like trying it again. And I'm like no idea I'm not a singer but there's that one choir apparently.
So tonight we went there together for the first time to check it out.
And there's like 80 people there, and they have, like, a big concert coming up in three weeks. Singing this impossible to sing thing by Bach. So it's like their second to last rehearsal and everyone knows their parts by heart by now. And is actually a singer, yo. But everyone's like oh welcome, thanks for coming, you sit here with the sopranos, you sit here with the tenors, here's the sheet music, ready steady go. Dafuq.
So my friend basically sat there for three hours flabbergasted, just listening to the gorgeous music.
And I'm like hold my beer. And just sight-read the whole thing with them.
I actually hit some of the notes, too. I think.
Great fun. Obviously much harder than I had ever imagined. But at the same time also much easier than I had feared.
And in the middle there was that one piece that was piss easy. I loved loved loved that one. Hit every note.
But yeah afterwards we agreed that maybe I should try the bass next time.
There were entire passages that I spent singing the tenor part an octave lower. That's the skill level I'm at haha.
Like, I took notice as I was doing it, and obviously they took notice, too. But with 80 people it basically didn't matter.
And the kicker is that even though my friend used to sing in a choir and I never did, she said she probably won't go again because it's too advanced for her. And I'm totally going next week because fuck it, I have nothing to lose only to gain. Funny how it works eh.
BTW, I have virtually no sheet music of Bach's. As in, an actual printed edition of anything. Just a couple little preludes and fugues for beginners that I used to play as a kid. Other than that, nothing, not even the well-tempered clavier.
The complete edition, a big fat book that I've had for 25 years and I have no idea where the fuck I even have it from. I remember I already had it in high school, we used to point and laugh at the title because the word is so silly. Motets. Huhuhuhuhuh. Motets.
I never even looked inside I don't think. Just at the cover. And laughed.
But there you go. 25 years later I can take it with me to my very second choir lesson. If that's no sign, I don't know what is.