What a lovely way to start off Christmas week – our joint show with the A-Maz-Ing and hugely entertaining Great Western Chorus on Saturday, 19th December. Both choruses came together for the opening and closing numbers – over 90 mixed voices giving it wellie – to a full house of a really appreciative audience.  GWC’s in-house  group H Club and FR’s RhythmMix added something a little different to the programme; mince pies in the interval, lots of tinsel and sparkle in the second half and a special guest … Elvis Presley singing ‘Blue Christmas’!  Worth missing the Strictly Finals for.

Saturday 5th December saw us return again to M & S, Cribbs Causeway for some festive season singing.  Last year we had a space in Ladies Lingerie – this year we were in very close proximity to Gents boxers!  Right by the entrance onto the Mall, our carols were embellished by a very nicely toned security alarm sounding at intervals, and further enhanced by the tooting of the Mall’s ‘weary shopper’ train doing it’s circuit (see the MD’s frozen smile).  Very complimentary and generous shoppers filled our bucket which raised over £100 for M & S’s Breast Cancer and our own Home Start Stroud charities.  We were exceptionally well looked after by the store’s staff – and tickled pink to be asked back for next year.  Wonder which department ….

We had the most fantastic time at our Annual Convention in Bournemouth over the Halloween weekend and are so, so pleased to have jumped two places up the rankings with improved scores (they maybe tiny, but they count) with consistency across all three judging categories.  All choruses have to work harder and harder each year to cling on – there are currently 8 choruses scoring between 70.1 and our 74.1, so we know we’ve got our work cut out for next year.  The dazzling scores of our top chorus, the fabulous White Rosettes at 83.4, gives some idea of just how good they are and the gap we’re trying to bridge.  And biting their ankles with 82.2 is Amersham A Cappella – so nobody will be resting on their laurels.

This, our 20th Anniversary year, has been full on – first with our very successful show in June which really stretched us; we learned so much from it (apart from 6 new songs in as many months!), and then working with such commitment to achieve a decent convention result.  We are truly indebted to our excellent and awesome Coach, Sally McLean, who encourages us to believe in ourselves yet still maintain a sense of humour.

We’re now looking forward to a joint Christmas Show with the Great Western Chorus – 2015 Gold Medal Champions.  What a cracking way to finish off 2015!

Fascinating Rhythm was formed 20 years ago in 1995, and we felt had to ‘push the boat out’ to mark the occasion with a Celebration Show.  In collaboration with Rachel Bosomworth and her team from Love’s Bet

MD Jo Dean thanking a fantastic audience.

Productions amateur dramatic group and Junior FR we set about working our socks off to present a high quality musical show in just 6 months. We learned 6 new songs to add to our repertoire together with some exciting new skills that included acting, dancing and comedy (!).  All the hard work and commitment paid off with sell-out performances for both the matinee and evening show, exceeding expectations for both us and, we hope, the audience!  

Themed on ‘Songs from Stage & Screen’ we opened the show with a 10-part arrangement of ‘Mr Blue Sky’, then offered up songs from, amongst others, Oliver, Chess, Chicago, Les Miserables, and Lady and the Tramp … nineteen in all – phew, still recovering, especially with the number of costume changes.   Love’s Bet Productions provided comedy with their version of ‘The Song That Goes Like This’

Whooo hooo – sing AND dance!

(Spamalot) as did FR’s rendition of ‘Anything You Can Do’ (Annie Get Your Gun) that started with a no-holds-barred tap dance-off from our twinkle toed Jane Sawyer and Julie Bath. ‘The Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy’ (Nutcracker Ballet) went well with a very unusual in-house comedy dance team involving black and white tights, accompanied by an excellent (and very camp) male ballet dancer … absolutely hilarious. Good job we’d seen it in rehearsals or we’d not have been able to sing.

As ever, Junior FR stole the show when they joined us for Oliver, complete with Victorian costume. They had their own spot for a medley of songs by Queen and then did an inspiring percussion accompaniment to the ‘Cup Song’.  They are an awesome team who do Wendy Howse (MD), and FR Senior proud.

MD Jo Dean actually got a chance to sing with a ‘goose-bump’ version of ‘I Know Him So Well’ duet with Ali Jack – founder member of FR from inception in 1995 when it was known as ‘Rainbow’. Ali received a very special award for her dedication and commitment to Fascinating Rhythm, holding numerous titles during her time with us. Our youngest member, Georgia Radcliffe, has been with the Chorus for 10 years, joining when she was just 12; when she sang her solo ‘On My Own’ (Les Mis) – definitely not a dry eye in the house.

We were honoured to have current LABBS Chairman Brenda Rothwell in the audience along with Jean Olman, who has been our LABBS representative since the beginning and from whom we have always had great support and encouragement, along with past Directors and members, who have all been very much a part of our journey.  It’s all been very different from the usual concert-type performance we’re used to and at times we’ve been waaay out of our comfort zone but it’s been so well worth it – we’ve learned much along the way.

Amazing!

What are the odds of two unrelated young ladies of similar age with identical height, build, hair style and colour – both singing Tenor in different barbershop choruses not too many miles away from each other?   Caroline Bamford from Bristol Fashion and Hannah Richmond from Fascinating Rhythm met for the first time at our 20th Anniversary Celebration Show.  Like looking in a mirror, from spectacles even down to the same style handbag.  We think this must come under the heading of weird … and quite wonderful!

It was a glorious evening with over 500 spectators at this annual event in Gloucester on 4^th July and on the strength of their past performances, JFR were asked to open the proceedings. With a set of 6 songs, mixing a cappella, backing tracks and accompaniment by pianist Jo Luddington, each was introduced with a short speech from individual girls and delighting the audience with their percussion skills whilst accompanying their FR helpers singing The Cup Song from ‘Pitch Perfect’.
Wendy Howse (MD) received much praise from the audience on behalf of JFR including this from Robert Pardoe (organiser and MD of the Iron Acton Choir) “…your young girls are a credit to you and an absolutely perfect example of the power of community singing…Brilliant stuff.”
Proms was a fabulous way to finish a very successful year for Junior FR who now break for the summer, but will return in September for the next chapter.

What a weekend!  We scored 68.1 and came 7th in the UK, winning the Novice competition at LABBS Prelims on 20^th June. We have been together as a quartet for 9 months so it’s very early in our journey;  we are very proud and feel  blessed to have achieved this as well as being great friends. Our score would have seen us in 4^th position last year, so it’s good to see the quartet standard constantly improving each year.  We would like to thank our coaches Linda Corcoran, Peter Kennedy and Craig Kehoe as well as Fascinating Rhythm’s lovely MD Jo Dean. We have lots still to learn and many things to work on after our evaluation day on the Sunday.  Look out for us in October – we are drawn 13th (our lucky number) when we hope to surprise you with our exciting new set of songs.

Jane, Caz, Gill and Lara

Well, actually it was in the Per Una section of the M & S flagship store at the Cribbs Causeway Mall in Bristol, but makes a better headline.  Sunday, 10th May saw us arriving in our magenta gear to be individually checked in by really great M & S staff who couldn’t have been more helpful and welcoming.  We were taken upstairs and through a veritable maze of corridors to one of their staff rooms for a quick tidy/warm up, then one of us with a very good sense of direction got us all safely back to the Per Una section where an area had been cleared for us.  We did two sessions either side of lunch, handed out flyers for our upcoming 25th Anniversary Show on 27th June, and raised a fair bit of money for M & S’s charity this year – Prostate Cancer.  Such is our discipline now that we kept our eyes firmly on MD Jo Dean, whilst surrounded by some very tempting quality sale rails.

FR’s Tenor Section Leader, Ali Jack, has been adding to her considerable collection of medals when her mixed quartet Jigsaw won Silver at the Spanish Convention earlier this month (April).  Ali sings with her partner Peter Nugent who arranges many of our songs and makes excellent teach tracks for us.  Nooj also recorded and produced our first CD ‘Listen to the Music’.  Donna (ex FR member) and her partner Keef make up the rest of the quartet.  Jigsaw also guested on a gig Fascinating Rhythm had for the Thornbury Welsh Society on 11th April and were a very classy addition to the programme.

From Thursday, 2nd April 2015, our new home will be The Greenfield Centre in Winterbourne, South Gloucestershire.  We’ve loved being at King George V Community Centre in Rangeworthy which has seen us rise through our National Competition rankings from 22nd to our current 7th place but with the expansion of the Chorus to nearly 60 members, we find we’ve outgrown the space available.  So, our thanks go to our old home which holds some great memories – and we look forward to continuing enjoying this amazing hobby of ours at Greenfield.