When Fears Come True

So the three of us have been practicing with the women's Gospel Choir with the moms of kids at the school since we got here and our first concert was last Saturday. I've enjoyed it for the most part. Practices are a nice break from the school day and I've enjoyed singing even though most songs are in Japanese and I don't know what I'm singing. My friend Stacy, who went on this trip last year, had warned me of getting asked to sing a solo at a concert. I thought we had lucked out because as it got closer and closer to the concert, we still hadn't been asked.

However, my fear came true when the director asked us at the final practice if one of us would sing a verse of "Amazing Grace," one of the few songs in English we'd be performing at the concert. Lori and I quickly volunteered Mike to do it because he actually has musical talent and has sung in a micronphone before. Being the good guy that he is, he agreed to, so I hoped for a second that I was safe from singing. But then she asked if Lori and I would sing together on the second verse, which seemed better than a solo except this verse was in Japanese. We had to agree. There was no way out of it.

Now this really might not seem like a big deal because its just one verse and would probably take only 30 seconds of humiliation tops. But singing in public with my real singing voice ranks pretty high on my fears list. I often sing for my friends or to the kids in my "fake voice" which is also bad but bad on purpose. Lori and I practiced our part several times the night before the concert. Lori wasn't looking forward to singing either, but she actually seems like she has some musical knowledge. She tried to give me some direction, which I was thankful for. We just couldn't get one note to sound quite right because it was so high (the note for "me" in "...that saved a wretch like me"). I couldn't wait to have the solo behind me and enjoy the rest of the concert singing with the mommies.

Minako took some pictures of the concert. Here's our shining moments!



















Here's Lori and I over in the alto section singing "This is the Day," another one in English
















Mike doing his solo part in amazing grace. He sounded really good! He's the only boy in the choir!















And finally, Lori and I doing our duet! I'm not sure how we actually sounded; people told us we did good but I think they were just being nice. I actually wasn't as nervous as I thought I'd be, but it was a relief to have it done with!











Here's the whole choir. We have to hold our music so we can read the Japanese, so it gets a little awkward when the director adds in sign langauge and clapping. For some of the songs we practiced more, I've been able to pick up on the words, but others not so much.

We did a couple songs with the kids in the audience. The kids have choir with the director during the week too.

I think we're all done with concerts for the rest of our trip, but we might start practices back up after Spring Break. Looking back, I'm glad I could face this fear with Lori and praise God at the same time. To Him, our singing was beautiful!