A break in the action

Last evening (Thursday ) I took a break from my shed work to go to a second Kathy Bullock workshop with River Singers. Kathy is a wonderful choral director, a passionate gospel pianist and singer, and a beautiful woman of faith and human being. She is a joy to be with and to sing with. The songs she chooses are all from the black gospel tradition, and are often very moving. This time I felt she had chosen them just for me. I just let myself cry, and I'm not the only one. One is called Even Me as sung by Patrick Lundy.  The lyrics are:

Lord I hear showers of blessing 

Thou art scattering full and free. 

Showers the thirsty souls refreshing 

Let some drops now fall on me.

Even me, Lord, even me. 

Let some drops now fall on me. 

As is typical of this tradition, this is sung over and over, building more and more feeling, and in addition to piano and chorus, and Kathy's solo soprano adding a kind of descant, there are instruments- a sax, trombone, violin and oboe! It's pretty powerful. Maybe the concert tomorrow night will go up on YouTube  - it has in the past. I 'll let you know . 

 Kathy Bullock at piano rehearsing the musicians before the full rehearsal

     River Singers in rehearsal last night

Since we missed so many weeks of rehearsal by being out west, we won't be singing tomorrow night, but we'll sure be at the concert! 

After the workshop I stopped by John and Cynthia's which is just a mile or two down the road from the church where River singers holds their rehearsals. I had seen John since we returned, but not Cynthia. We had a cup of tea and a nice visit. John has gotten very interested in electric guitars! He had bought one from a friend a few months ago, but something about it didn't quite please him, though he liked it ok. So he got another one online from Goodwill! A Fender Guitar, for $40! He wants to replace the pickups on it, but he likes it! He joked that he has "gas" - "guitar acquisition syndrome." I asked when I would get to hear him play it, and he said, "oh, in about ten years." I hope he can speed that up a bit for my sake. 

         The first guitar John bought

   The recent acquisition from Goodwill

(John removed the strings and will replace them, and probably replace some of the electronics, but it's basically in good condition. Which is lucky because when you buy from Goodwill online, there are no returns.)