Stand-in musical director for Fernhurst Choral Society's November concert

Fernhurst Choral Society accompanist George Haynes will be their musical director for their next concert while Tim Ravalde is on paternity leave.

Transcript

00:00Good afternoon, my name is Phil Hewitt, Group Arts Editor at Sussex Newspapers. Always lovely

00:06to speak to George Haynes. And George, you are in a slightly unfamiliar role. You work

00:11as Companist with Fernhurst Choral Society, but at the moment, in Tim's paternity leave,

00:17you are the music director, choral director, and you are in charge for the concert, which

00:22is coming up very soon. Remind me of the date. What's the date of the concert?

00:28It's Saturday the 16th, yes. And we were saying that it's good for the choir and it's

00:33good for you, isn't it, that they're working with someone else, albeit someone they know?

00:38Yes, exactly. I'm really lucky to have an amazing opportunity to work with a choir that

00:45I know really well. I've played for them for several years now, but I'm getting this lovely

00:50opportunity to conduct them and get to know how I can improve things or change things

00:57a little bit and offer my own musical interpretation, which I think will be of great benefit to

01:02them and to me going on. And does it make a difference knowing that

01:06this is a very finite time you are in charge? Well, in a way, I suppose that's quite fun

01:12because you're only being allowed to do one big concert. There's a lot of pressure there,

01:17but also basically I'm determined to just have great fun on the day, especially with

01:24the fun repertoire that we're doing. Yes. Now Chichester Psalms, what's the challenge,

01:29the attraction to be performing that? So the Chichester Psalms are probably in

01:37the top level of difficulty in our repertoire, in Furness's usual repertoire. They're used

01:43to doing Romantic or Classical or Baroque works a lot of the time. But the Chichester

01:48Psalms have a few big challenges. They have the influence of Classical and Jazz and Musical

01:55Theatre on the music, so you have to sing in a slightly more bold way perhaps. And also

02:00you have to sing in Hebrew, which not really any other choral music exists that you have

02:06to do that. So it is a unique piece. Absolutely. And fabulous contrast then because

02:11you're also doing the Requiem for his Requiem, which the pressure is slightly different because

02:16it's a piece that everyone knows or thinks they know. Yes, you do feel that sort of looming,

02:22the audience knowing how it goes and they will want to hear a really perfect performance

02:27of that. But we're determined to try and do that and offer a nice fresh performance of

02:31that beautiful, famous piece. Fantastic. Well, all good wishes for the concert.

02:38Lovely to speak to you. Thank you so much. And you, thank you. Bye.