Lovely Spring day at Champs Hill

A beautiful spring day followed by a lovely evening at Champs Hill... in aid of Dreambuilding.

One of the many statues in the gorgeous Champs Hill garden, with colour all around.

I had a walk around the garden with the house dog, who found his rubber chicken in this particular flower bed; his search is about to begin below.

Walking around here put us in a good mood for our evening; the tickets had sold very quickly for the event... a lovely meal in the concert hall-cum-art gallery (& recording studio!); an auction... with auctioneer, Charles Collingwood... and then us to end the evening!

All terrific... great to see Charles Collingwood (Brian Aldridge in BBC Radio 4's The Archers, btw) & indeed his wife Judy Bennett (Shula in BBC Radio 4's The Archers, btw)... he splendidly shepherded the auction to collecting many thousands for the charity... a very successful evening for the new building for a local hospice.
We had previously met them both at our Cricket 'Rhyme and Season' evenings, as organised by the late-lamented David Rayvern Allen, at Lord's, Hambledon and elsewhere, where Charles, a keen cricketer himself always read/acted hilariously!

As ever, the Champs Hill room was a delight in which to sing, and the audience enjoyed music from Henry VIII to Elton John, via The Mills Brothers and Laurel & Hardy!

Chris Hatt was once again with us at the piano, so all five of us had a splendid time... Sarah-Ann was especially impressed with a bucket of sausages as big as her head!

Champs Hill concert, In Tune & Belgian tour starts

Festival of Carols in Two Minutes Vienna video is HERE
Go on - have a wee look!

We went to a wonderful party...
At the home of the glorious record company, and of course David and Mary, we performed in the lovely hall here surrounded as ever by great art, with a terrific piano (played terrifically as ever by Chris Hatt), an evening of Christmas jollity.

Of course, a lovely room to sing in, and a hall packed to the rafters - a new experience; to record an album in a room, and then go back six months later to the same room and perform a vast amount of it to an audience!

My dressing room was invaded by this little chap... he wasn't after my socks luckily!

A splendid afternoon at the BBC in the company of Sean Rafferty and the Team at In Tune...
Four songs from A Song for Christmas & two bits of interview too!  Chris Hatt was there too!

You can listen again here: Starting at 1'25"
(Of course the other guests were all marvellous too!)
We sing:
Let it Snow! Let it Snow! Let it Snow!
A Festival of Carols in Two Minutes
Nativitie
&
Twelve Days to Christmas (from She Loves Me)

Sean was as ever professionalism itself and a delight to chat to.

Then it was up early the next morning for the Eurostar to Belgium (thank goodness we're not flying anywhere at the moment!) and a 2PM concert at Vilvoorde.  The audience were well up for a Christmas afternoon and great fun was had by all.  Elke and her team looked after us very well.
We also were joined, as we shall be for all of these gigs, Koen on sound and lights; a splendid addition to the team and how excellent he was! (In fact he is hard at work as I write to make sure Scherpenheuvel is an equal success...)
Here is the beautiful Scherpenheuvel Basiliek (that is not a giant snake, for any Harry Potter fans)

Three concerts until Christmas; Scherpenheuvel, Ternat and Bruges... then after it is our four nights at The Pheasantry on the Kings Road, Chelsea (27th-30th Dec)... have you bought your tickets yet?

Champs Hill Christmas CD Recording

Marvellous few days recording our new Christmas CD at the exquisite Champs Hill in Sussex.... (The record label already has our Songs of Love & War).

Two days down & one to go (19 pieces done & 8 left!) - you will get a list soon!

Here we are having lunch in the gardens ... well, here is Sarah-Ann & Chris x 2 (both Hatt & O'Gorman varieties!)

Our old friend Andrew Mellor is in charge of making everything sound splendid (he has been involved in three projects with us before); wonderful to have the brilliant Chris Hatt play the piano (he is already on our Songs of Cricket CD) & we also have had Paul Plummer coming down and further honing everything to splendid proportions (with his excellent ears)!

What joys - as ever, we are endebted to David and Mary & all the Champs Hill team...

Hoorah for it all...

More news (& even sounds!) when we have it ...

Final Recording Session

Managed a rather magical image with my phone!  Here is Richard, taken through a window, thus the garden-frame is reflection - sadly some of my forehead in shot too!!

Final day of recording for new album at Champs Hill, with the terrific Malcolm Martineau on piano too - splendid...
Songs of Love & War - out in 2013 we expect... more news when we have it.

Great studio to record in... picaresque views, art on the walls... all gorgeous.

Champs Hill & Malcolm...

Great day down at Champs Hill, recording with Malcolm Martineau at the piano...
We completed everything we planned; Vaughan Williams, Haydn, Bridge, Poulenc, Quilter & Heneker - splendid - thus (working title) Songs of Love and War is well on its way; one more recording day, we feel and we will have all...
With our schedule in the next few weeks (and Malcolm's more so!), we 're not sure when we will finish all this... but we'll keep you posted!

Off this am to record a quick demo of a song for the new Tim Rice musical... (From Here to Eternity)... no waves in the studio, I think...

CH Recording #2 & Tim Rice bash

We had second successful day at Champs Hill, after a splendid meal and night there (none of us had been to bed so early for years!); Producer Alex served us well again, keeping us on the straight and narrow... & almost all the a cappella stuff is done... Hooray!
Mary & David are such good hosts; I think we may enjoy doing this again...

Then today, we were up bright and early for a sound check at the Dorchester Ballroom, Park Lane, in preparation for being Sir Tim Rice's backing group in our hit, 'Wanderin' Star'... (accompanied on the piano by Chris Hatt). We sang a grace and a couple of cricket songs too...
Lots of money was raised for the Lady Taverners charity in this lunch in celebration of Tim... many famous names gave messages by audio and video, as well as of course, many others being there in person. Rachael Heyhoe-Flint [newly ennobled], Judith Chalmers, a sea of Rices [Tim's two brothers did a great double act & Tim's children gave him a revealing and hilarious quiz (which he passed!)], Jack Rowell, Bella Emberg, Angela Rippon, Tony Lewis, Christopher Martin-Jenkins & Mike Gatting were all there... People were meant to be sardonic and funnily horrid, but TRice being such a nice chap, this never lasted long and all ended up saying what a great friend he is, and all-round jolly fellow!
I had forgotten how central to getting ladies admitted to the MCC he was - Rachael was very moving on the subject.-

Also on the musical bill, a quick recital of oscar-winning hits from Alan Menken (glorious); and duets and solos from Tim Rice & Friends, performed by Emma Munro-Wilson & Lewis Bradley, accompanied by Duncan Waugh.

Messages came from Elaine Page, Andrew Lloyd Webber, Elton John, Sir John Major - and the lunch only overran by an hour and ten minutes!

Another life-enhancing event, celebrating a truly Great Britain...

Champs Hill Recording #1

Presently at Champs Hill, recording our next album... Songs of Love and War:- doing the a cappella stuff on this sojourn... we will add the tracks with Malcolm Martineau when the great man is free! [Early next year...]

Fantastic room to sing in, atmosphere to record, and of course the surroundings at the Bowerman's... quite lovely... & the board and lodging is very good in this hotel too!
Yum!

The Producer is Alexander Van Ingen, and a fine chap he is... ably assisted by Clare...

One a cappella day down... one to go...

Classical Rolls Royce!

We are very blessed by our accompanists!
These days for our shows, on piano we have the fantastic Chris Hatt, the worldwide MD of Billy Elliot...
...and soon, because Chris is not free, we have the pleasant delight of working for a couple of Belgian nights with our previous chap, Paul Plummer, who is presently working at the opera house in Innsbruck...
...and now we also have the splendour of working once again with that Rolls Royce of classical accompanists, Malcolm Martineau. We are recording a third album with him, this time under the Champs Hill label - in November for release next year. We had a rehearsal yesterday, and it was as we have come to expect when we work with MM... looking forward to the CD very much.

It is loosely based on the concert we performed together in the Musée d'Orsay, Paris in March...
Songs of Love and Death/War... (to be decided)...

There is a Paradise...

We began our evening of The Best of British as part of the Chichester Festivities with Robert Pearsall's There is a Paradise on Earth - a perfect description of Champs Hill where we performed to a packed house.

Accompanied with his usual poise by Chris Hatt, we went through many British institutions - Shakespeare, G & S, Noel Coward, Edward Lear, Elton John, Rice & Lloyd-Webber, Peter Warlock, The Beatles, The Weather, The Underground, The Pre-Raphaelites and of course, Cricket...

Excellent to be part of the Chichester Fest again, and to be in The Music Room at Champs Hill in the West Sussex countryside was splendid.... we have performed here before only at private parties... we look forward to being here more [in fact, another dinner next month beckons!]
The Music Room also houses part of a wonderful art collection... an all-round artistic experience.