Canto (Or Won't-o)

Last month, at my birthday, Pete confessed in a somewhat embarrassed fashion that he really enjoys singing as a part of Rock Band. I was delighted for him, but a little sad as well.

Singing, like sports, seems to have become one of those things that most of us are far happier to watch than we are to do ourselves. I'm comfortable speaking in front of large audiences, but the thought of singing solo feels me with apprehension.

It's understandable, I suppose. I have a colleague at work with a background in musical theater who says, "Sing, and show me your soul." I suppose most of us are reluctant to make ourselves so vulnerable, and besides, there are so few real opportunities.

Friday night, Audrey, Glory and I went to see the ESO's production of Carmina Burana, which Fenya's choir was performing in. In all, there were 200 voices in support of the orchestra, and it was an intense musical experience to say the least.

Before the show, Cantilon performed in the Upper lobby of the Winspear, and one of their selections was a Finnish folk tune they had competed with earlier in the year, in which Fenya has a solo.

Like most of us in the household, Fenya is her own harshest critic (yes, even more so than her own musical director!), but she was actually very happy with the job she had done in the competition's recording, and had received quite a bit of good feedback on it. I was delighted to hear her perform it in the lobby, same as I was when she did it at her spring concert back on Mother's Day:

Today at church she had been asked to sing, and given free rein to choose her tune and little time to rehearse, she chose "Will Ye Go, Lassie, Go", a melancholy Scottish folk song. I had chided her a bit at breakfast about the lack of a spiritual component, but in the context of the service, which dealt with both the Season of Creation and Aboriginal Sunday, it worked out beautifully:

Oh the summertime is coming
And the trees are sweetly blooming
And the wild mountain thyme
Grows around the blooming heather
Will ye go, Lassie, go?

And we'll all go together
To pluck wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather
Will ye go, Lassie, go?

I will build my love a tower
Near yon' pure crystal fountain
And on it I will build
All the flowers of the mountain
Will ye go, Lassie, go?

And we'll all go together
To pluck wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather
Will ye go, Lassie, go?

If my true love she were gone
I would surely find another
To pluck wild mountain thyme
Grows around the blooming heather
Will ye go, Lassie, go?

And we'll all go together
To pluck wild mountain thyme
All around the blooming heather
Will ye go, Lassie, go?

After listening to an elder from Alexander First Nation talk about the importance of collaboration and forgiveness on the road to reconciliation, the words "And we'll all go together" resonated deeply within men, and of course, it sounded beautiful too.

But afterwards, as we sung from the same hymnbook together, her voice soaring while mine plodded along, I felt myself carried along. Dozens of voices, working together; some gifted, others less so, but all keeping the tune, all showing the souls of their owners.

And better still, on the way home, with the windows and sunroof open, singing along with Stan Rogers and company to the choruses of Barrett's Privateers, oblivious to what other might have thought, and not caring at any rate.

Motivational speaker Zig Ziglar liked to say, "We don't sing because we're happy; we're happy because we sing," and I believe this to be true. It's a shame our egos lead us to deny ourselves such a simple, natural joy, but I guess there is always karaoke and Rock Band.