It started in Melbourne - with 10,000 people that first year - and now hundreds of thousands attend gatherings great and small in pretty much every community in the country.
Millions more curl up on the couch on Christmas Eve to watch the annual televised version.
There is rarely a wet weather contingency plan in place
because it's taken as read that the weather will co-operate as we're into Summer here, but there has been an unseasonal [ and gratefully received ] downpour over half the country for the last week.
The local Rotary Club Carols By Candlelight was scheduled for an 8pm start at Victory Park yesterday evening and when we foregathered from 5.30 for choir practice and nibblies, there was some question as to what the weather would do. The skies were grey and leaden and not at all encouraging
would anyone turn up ?
it didn't seem very likely
and right on cue, precisely at 8pm, the heavens opened and a deluge of Biblical proportion ensued
... instead of the Nativity, we were suddenly looking for a bloke named Noah !!
but did the prospect of floating down Barker's Street stop us ?
not on your nellie
... they make 'em tough in Castlemaine
This:
is the Thompson Foundry [Brass] Band [ you may need to click for the larger image to really see what's going on ] with three brave carollers at the front. From our vantage point off to the side, we sang along but the sound was so muffled by the rain we just hoped that we were singing the same verse :]
5 comments:
A belated Happy Birthday!
Thanks for sharing photos of your BEAUTIFUL home! I have enoyed looking through the pictures again and again. What eye candy.
God bless you!
Tracy
They do make them tough! Carols would be tough by candlelight in a deluge.
When the late Norman Banks (Melbourne Radio Announcer) first conceived the idea of 'Carols by Candlelight' all those years ago, he could scarcely have forseen how readily it would be accepted and how far it would spread.
Perhaps he's 'looking down' on many of those celebrations even now, in big cities and smaller towns, like Castlemaine.
... and I only just did the maths and realised that this year marks the 70th anniversary of the first Carols by Candleight
... and
Nadie and Chris will be up here for Christmas Eve along with Nonna so Nadie's fiance, aka The Boy, will have the dubious pleasure of listening to/joining Nadie and I as we warble along with the telly
Unfortunately, Wyndham City Council at Werribee Park, which is a large event was moved indoors. Sylvie Palidino (sp) was the guest soloist so it was a shame.
I sang in the choir of the first Carols by Candlelight at the music bowl. Have the music folder which I must post to Vision Australia before I die as they do not have that issue. We reaheased in the old 3KZ studio in Lygon St on the edge of Carlton and the city.
I wish I could remember more but I remember the rehearsals more than the night. It must have been around 1958 or 9. I think Norman Banks helped train us or ?? There is a huge number of carols in the folder. A lovely one by a Salvation Army author called "Open wide the stable door" It has remained a favorite although I have only ever heard it when I have sung it.
Have also sung in choirs there at other events which helps the foggy mind.
But it is my one really loved Christmas tradition and I love to be home alone with no one making comments about what they like and don't like....me being odd, I seldom join in the singing but just lay on the sofa and enjoy.
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