Annual General Meeting
4 October 2021
Earlier this evening the choir held its Annual General Meeting,
followed by its usual Monday night rehearsal. We were warmly
welcomed by the staff at
The Old
Savoy, our usual rehearsal at Northampton High School being
unavailable this week, and swiftly sorted out the arrangements to
ensure we could sing in a socially distanced fashion. At our AGM we elected our new Treasurer, Prof. Jackie Campbell,
and our new Concerts Manager, David Tristram, and very warm
tributes were made to retiring holders of those posts Tim Daily
and Mark Gibson.
The Old Savoy on Arrival
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Members Award for Jennie Woods
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Our President, Sir Peter Ellwood CBE DL gave one of his
trademark stunning speeches, paying special tribute to Lee and the
committee for steering the choir through one of the most remarkable
- for good and ill - years in the choir’s history. Further tribute
was paid to our “Rebuilding Team” who have countered the inevitable
losses of the last year with an astonishing tally of sixteen new
members so far this term, with a further three auditioning later
this week! As we weren’t able to meet “in reality” for our AGM last
year, we had two years of our Members Award to present.
John Tye singing in our Christmas concert
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Long Service Award for Karen Emmott
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For the first year this went to Jennie Woods, who was for a
time our Chairman, but retirement from the committee hasn’t
prevented her from being an avid fundraiser for the choir, not least
in masterminding the visit of John Rutter back in September 2019.
For the most recent year this was awarded posthumously to John
Tye who was for many years our Bass Voice Part Secretary, and
whose untimely death at the end of July shocked us all. In addition
Long Service Awards were made to members who have recently marked
their twenty-fifth anniversary of singing with the choir, including
Karen Emmott, and a special award was made to long-serving
Voice Part Secretary Mary Montague on her retirement from
that role.
Retiring VPS Mary Montague
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The evening concluded with our fifth Messiah rehearsal of the
term, and once we had acclimatised to the acoustics, we continued
work on polishing and honing our interpretation of this masterwork
in preparation for our concert on Saturday 6 November.
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