One of the activities I have taken most pleasure in during my time in Beijing has been singing with a group of men in an octet. I created the octet with seven other singers from the Deutsche Kantorei Peking: four tenors and four basses. We call ourselves "The deep side" of the Kantorei.
We have been rehearsing regularly for small projects linked to the German evangelical church, or to produce our own concerts in bars around town. We sing an eclectic repertoire of music going from Renaissance to modern arrangements of popular music; we explore the German-, French-, English-language repertoires, with some attempts at traditional songs in exotic languages such as Basque.
Most important for me, this group is also a source of companionship and good fun. Apart from the singing, we also take the opportunity to share a meal and drinks at each rehearsal and after our concerts.
Not only do we enjoy singing, eating and drinking together, but our audiences also enjoy our performances. We still have to work on knowing our parts better so as to lift our heads out of the scores and interact with our audience; we are told this eye contact is still missing. We will be working on it for our future gigs. We already have two producers who want us to sing again in their venue.
Despite covid sometimes preventing all eight singers to take part in an event, those who are left still keep singing with glee!
The Anacreontick Song
J.S. Smith, The Hilliard ensemble, The singing club, Harmonia mundi
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