beauty

[this photo was taken a few mornings ago when i woke up and saw sunshine lighting up actual leaf buds on the tree outside my bedroom window.  i rushed outside to capture the moment.  after a winter as long as this one, tiny red fuzz feels like a miracle!]

tonight, my women’s quartet went on an outing.  we’ve been on a hiatus since our coffeehouse in february because one of our members had a baby, but we’ve been planning this outing for… months and months and months.  the musical group “anonymous 4” came to town for a concert tonight and we went to hear them.   ahhhhhh…… aural bliss.  we managed to get seats in the fourth row which, while maybe not the audio “sweet spot” of the concert hall, were fantastic in my opinion.  i don’t often get to sit so close to a musical performer.  it was such fun to really be able to see their facial expressions and notice their hand movements and so many other tiny details that i usually miss from the cheap seats.  i was also reassured by how down-to-earth they all were–real people with real bodies and real hair singing real, real good.
i knew it was going to be a great concert when the first two songs made me cry (thanks, a4, for singing “never grow old”!  it was awesome to hear it done by the real deal!) and get that giant “happy concert smile” that mr. h-s knows so well.  they are touring with two string players–one mandolin and fiddle player and one guitarist.  i loved what they added to the concert, but my favorite moments were still the acapella bits.  i think the highlight of the concert for me (and i’m not exactly sure why this one stood out to me so strongly) was “shall we gather at the river” which they sang near the end.  it was just so crystal clear and i loved to really be able to see how they split up the voice parts.  on the recording, their voices blend so well (and even in person it was sometimes hard to discern who was singing what) that we sometimes have to guess if they’re singing in three part or four part.  it was a little easier to pick out parts in person and it was soooooo earluscious!  we also noticed that sometimes they’ll switch parts on different verses–maybe trading off who has to do the high notes, but because each of their voices is unique, switching parts like that adds variety to the verses.  great (and relatively simple) technique!

we left the concert feeling inspired and ready to start singing again (if only there weren’t school assignments cluttering up our lives!).