Saturday 13th April saw us all on a coach to Whitby for the annual Eskdale Music Festival.  We had an early start in Penistone at 9.00am.  Less than two hours later we were at the coast, on a beautiful, clear, sunny but very cold day.  We had a few hours to while away before we were to rehearse at 2.00pm & perform at 3.00pm.  Some of us wandered into Whitby for an early fish ‘n chip lunch, to buy kippers and fresh crab, others stayed warm in the Pavillion.

Our trip coincided with Whitby Goth Weekend, so there were certainly some spectacles to be seen, although we couldn’t quite work out what some of the costumes were meant to be.  It was almost “Anything Goes”, so long as it was black, purple, or gold & had feathers.

Then we were singing….  We warmed up in a corridor (we have done worse!), very narrow, steamy and squishy for two full choirs!  We entered two classes:- the Christmas In April class & the Ladies Choir class.  In the Christmas class we were competing against ourselves, as we sang firstly on our own as Penistone Ladies, then with our chums Skelmanthorpe Male Voice Choir, as “Yorkshire Mixtures”.

We were blown away to come away with two first places & two cups, for both the Christmas and the Ladies Class.  Incredibly the Ladies Class included the set piece of Mr Sandman, which very few of us felt confident about and which usually brought about a big groan every time Jane asked us to rehearse it.   Thanks Jane for your confidence in us…our view of Mr Sandman may just change now!

It was also lovely to see Skelmanthorpe MVC placed second & third in their classes and thanks to them for joining forces with us once again.

We were thrilled to take first prize in the Female Voice Choirs class at the Penistone Competitive Music Festival on Saturday 29 September. And with it we were awarded The Alice Milnes Memorial Trophy. We were up against two other local choirs and sang two contrasting pieces of our choice “Lit’le David Play on yo Harp” and El Condor Pasa.
There were three special things about the day…the first was that it was the 50th Annual Festival. Secondly, the trophy that we won was commissioned by our choir in memory of Alice Milnes, who had a long association with the choir. The third is more to do with the male voice choir in our neighbouring village of Millhouse Green, as they founded the whole festival. We were delighted to see them coming first too, in their Male Voice Choir Class, in this 50th year!
The final class of the day was the Open Challenge Choral Class, in which 7 choirs participated – ladies’ choirs, male voice and mixed voice choirs. As the adjudicator, Marilynne Davies commented, it is unusual to have 7 choirs competing in an open class, when it is a festival that takes place in just one day. We weren’t placed in the evening class, but loved taking part, competing with and listening to all the other choirs.