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Priceless!
In November, about an hour before a band practice and less than 48 hours before the event itself, Jack Lonergan, our esteemed secretary, was called by a production company and asked to provide a band to play 'We Wish You A Merry Christmas' for an internet advertisement for a well-known credit card company. Being the intrepid, publicity-seeking, skint musicians we are, (is there any other kind?), we leapt at the opportunity for adventure, exposure and untold riches unreservedly. So it was that Deborah Archer, Colin Bennett, Barbara Page, Colin Reeves, Ruth Harrison, Jack and I, plus Andy Sibley from Epping Forest Band, turned up at Elstree Studio 8 on a Saturday afternoon, dressed in our braided and epauletted best with polished shoes and instruments and the butterflies-in-the-stomach feeling that comes from a leap into the unknown.
To me the studio was a bit of a surprise. I don't know, maybe I've watched too many television drama and sitcoms, but I expected it to be large and busy but also pristine, gleaming and buzzing with technology. It was a vast hanger of a place furnished with what seemed like dozens of large tables strewn with 'stuff' and with a set, lit and sparkling and far smaller than expected, off-centre. Various people were watching the action on large monitors. The technology seemed understated, (I don't really know what I was expecting). There was an air of frenetic activity mixed with extreme calm and it was all, to me, surreal and vaguely dreamlike. The set was a house front with a very wide front door that opened directly onto a family living-room.
When we arrived, a pantomime dame and principal boy, both extremely beautiful, were filming a dance number and the 'family' - a perfect combination of parents, grandparents and two young children, (one of each variety) - were milling off-set, awaiting their turn.
We were told that we would be needed in about an hour but nothing else, so we decided that we ought to practise so that we had some control over one aspect of our performance. Our original plan was to stand outside sufficiently distant from the studio to be unheard but we were offered the use of Studio 9; the 'Who Wants To Be A Millionaire' studio! Maybe some of the Chris Tarrant magic would rub off on us!
We arranged ourselves in a circle and started to play. We didn't know whether we would be required to play the carol once through or more often so we tried both. We worked on balance and dynamics, practiced starts and endings, slowed down and sped up. David Klein would have been proud of us.
Eventually it was our turn. We were placed in two rows outside the front door, the four attractive ones at the front, the ridiculously tall beings behind, and given our instructions. On the command of a lovely young man standing with us we would start to play. The front door would be opened by the father and we would walk, still playing, into the living-room. At the end of the carol the children would present two bandsmen with parcels, the father would present a cheque and the grandfather would place a ten pound note into the band's collecting tin.
We did it, with slight variations, maybe eight or nine times and the last time small details - the passing of the gifts, the cheque and the money - were filmed several times. Then we were done.
Our contribution is one of just twenty-four to be aired each day as an Advent calendar and at the time of writing we've not yet been seen. I am looking forward to it. I know that the rehearsing will have been a waste because the vignettes, it turns out, are silent, but we gave of our best - and that's what matters.
It took about two hours in all, plus an hour and a half round journey, a little sitting about and feeling nervous and was, I think, a wonderful experience and a new one for all of us. The band received a sizeable cheque but, more importantly, I spent a couple of hours doing something different that I enjoyed with people I like very much.
My verdict?
Priceless!
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